Perfect Gap Control While Forechecking
By Lisa Brown
If you’re smart about gap control when forechecking, you’ll become a fierce checking machine. To steal the ring 1 vs. 1, you’ll want to carefully control the gap – how much space there is between you and the ring carrier – when she is trying to carry the ring past you.
Many ringette players get excited and skate too close to the ring carrier (basically lunging at her, trying to get the ring) whenever they try to check. If you do this, the ring carrier will skate right by you because you are completely focused on the ring and she only needs to make one move. For examples of rushing too close to the ring carrier, watch these clips:
You can see that the checker is not thinking very far ahead. She rushes towards the ring and gets burned!
Too Far Gap
Another common sight in ringette is a checker trying to check her opponent from too far away.
When you are too far away, you skate towards the ring carrier, but you leave too late and never get close enough to her to even check her. Obviously, this will never work!
Just Right Gap
Instead, practice your timing so that you skate in front of the ring carrier close enough so that your stick can touch hers (you can check her) and stay in front of her. To maintain this body position, you will need to work hard and use ‘stop and start’ skating to mimic the ring carrier.
Starts and stops are more effective than ‘swooping’ and making big turns.
This is what makes checking such hard work, and why so few players can make the one-on-one steal: they get too excited and lunge at the ring carrier or they do not realize how much work it is. You need to match the speed of your opponent and try to slow her down using stop and start skating.
Once the ring carrier slows down (or stops), she will expose the ringette ring. At this point, you can either try to make the steal 1 vs. 1 or wait for help from a teammate. Again, this is a hard work, because you must stay in front of her when she is trying to get by you!
Key: Your goal should be to slow your opponent down or make her stop. Slowing down her momentum makes stealing the ring possible. A great clip of good gap control featuring former Edmonton Ringette Association star Laura Warner is here:
Notice how Laura is staying in front of the ring carrier and forcing her to slow down and stop. At this point she can either go for the check or a teammate will arrive and steal the ring.
Our forwards are not driving to the hot spot. They will do a drop pass and then continue to cycle! or they settle for the one time shot from too far away. What drills should we do to get them in there!?
Petite Provincial coach
Hi my name is Corina. i play ringette and i am 11 i am a center and need help on learning how to steal the ring when you are 1 vs 1 and how to avoid getting checked AND I WANT TO SKATE FASTER… PLZZ HELP ME I WANT TO BE A RINGETTE STAR PLEASEE????
Hi Corina,
Don’t worry about stealing the ring 1 on 1 because that’s not necessary. Learn how to work with a teammate to check 2 on 1. It’s a lot easier and you won’t get caught up the ice defensively. If you want to avoid getting checked, then get your feet moving and get away from pressure. To skate faster you need to work on your edges. I recommend power skating. It’s the best thing you can do to become a better player.
Cheers,
Lisa
Dawne, that’s a great question. All young ringette players do that. They become afraid to drive to the net. There is social pressure on a team to pass and set it up. They don’t understand that by driving to the net they are setting up a pass later. The ring carrier MUST be a threat to score and MUST drive to net every time she crosses the offensive blue line.
To start, do a simple shooting drill. Have the players shoot from the slot first and then the Hot Spot. Make sure there is a demo. Don’t just tell them to shoot from the Hot Spot. They need to do it both ways because they think they are shooting from the Hot Spot! Once they have this mastered, add one defender, then another, and a third. They will want to practice creating a 2 on 1 on the defensive triangle. But they need to drive to the Hot Spot first!
Cheers,
Lisa
i am always wondering how to score on all tree defence i dont ever know wich way to go they are always trying to chek me even when i am scating as fast as i can i cant get away.What do i do?
Hi Brianna,
I’m guessing that perhaps you are not skating fast as soon as you get the ring. Most players slow down for a moment or even stop once they get the ring, but they don’t know it. I’d recommend that you practice busting away with speed the second you get the ring until you find this comfortable to do during games. This will help you keep the ring under pressure.
Cheers,
Lisa
Hi,
My daughter is a U12-A goalie. My question is , what is the best way to help her forget and move on from a bad goal/game?
Thanks for your time.