There's No Better Time To Assert Your Dominance Than During Hockey Warm Ups
I’ve been spending my entire morning studying the official rulebook of hockey and nowhere in there does it say anything about players actually having to stay on their side of the redline during warmies. For some reason it’s just something that is expected for one team to warm up on one of the ice and the other team to warm up on the other. But what the heck is the point of that? If you’re going out there to play a game, especially in the playoffs like this Swedish league game, your goal is to own the entire night from the beginning of warm ups to the final whistle. Your goal is to own every single inch of that sheet of ice from start to finish. Not just one end of the ice. The whole damn thing. So why not put your dominance on display during warmups and get the mind games going as early as possible?
So let’s get the movement started right now. Warm ups are now only necessary for a few things. They are as following:
1) Checking out the girls in the crowd and making sure you get a little face time going. If you’re playing beer league, chances are there’s only one girl in the crowd and it’s some dude on the other team’s girlfriend because he needs her to drive her home after he gets hammered midway through the 2nd period. But still.
2) Ripping a few shots high and wide to make sure you get that glass rattling. Let’s everybody else on the ice know what kind of weight is behind your shot. That’s actually where playing in an empty barn is to your benefit. The less people in the crowd, the harder that shot off the glass echoes. A few off the crossbar and over the netting is also great for the confidence. But you never want to hit straight net during warmups. Not only does nobody hear how heavy your shot is, but you’re also wasting all of your good shots during warmies.
And 3) Intimidation. Get your few laps in, rip a few pucks off the glass, then once you’re doing 2v1’s don’t be afraid to just take the puck down to the other end of the ice and shoot on the other team’s goalie. Let him know you’re there. Don’t be afraid to cross over the red line while everybody is stretching. Tag a swig out of the other team’s water bottles. Take a few of their pucks and let them know that everything that touches the ice that night belongs to you. Dominate the warm ups, dominate the game.