Use Sport Performance, Human Devp & Leadership to advise on Athlete Devp ~London Knights (OHL) since 2021 ~Teacher~opinions my own~
London, Ontario
Joined November 2012
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You cannot manufacture an elite hockey player.
This message is mostly for parents as some believe they can and you may be causing harm to your children trying to.
Play, develop, and hopefully they love hockey!
18+ is usually when they may have opportunities to be elite.
Hockey advisors/agents and now life coaches that usually lack knowledge in one or more of: sport science, human development, and psychology is numerous.
They often don’t know what they don’t know to ask or learn about.
⚠️ Reading and learning isn’t an ability to apply either.
This is so good.
If you're involved in youth hockey in any way, this is such a great post from @matty_r_thomas on the ins and outs of running a youth organization. Amazing perspective.
thehockeythinktank.com/from-…
Parents of hockey players: you cannot manufacture an elite player 16-23 yrs
The amnt of phys, social, & emot skills required by a player to maintain/achieve elite ability, to even try & be a pro are huge
They consider your intentions… but they think critically about their ROI
Wendy Glover retweeted
We don’t prevent suicide by doing “safety assessments.” We prevent suicide by creating ongoing, meaningful connections where patients feel seen, heard, and understood in a relationship where they matter.
Wendy Glover retweeted
Using social media in middle school predicts lower standardized test scores in high school.
10th graders who started social media before 9th grade are ~6 months behind their peers on math & reading. They're more distracted by their phones.
No child should have access to social media.
Wendy Glover retweeted
The ruining of recreational sports is a significant issue in our current child mental health crisis.
Kids need developmental spaces where parental driven competition isn’t front and center.
We traded true development for profits…
I’ve learned “it depends.”
Some need ⛳️ 🎣 ⚾️ etc
Some parents or coaches damage the process.
Some thrive.
Some burnout.
Those who pursue legit imprvmt usually like the “work”.
*Personality & adolescent (PIES) devp 16-24 yrs matters way more than people realize in player devp
While summer should be a time for recharging the battery and developing off the ice for kids, it’s become too close to a 365 job that’s leading to more and more burnout. Kids need to miss the game a little bit so when they come back for the season, they’re chomping at the bit ready to go.
In our latest podcast episode, we talked about the biggest things we’ve learned in youth hockey.
A couple decades ago we still had so many multi-sport athletes that didn’t think this way.
I didn’t hear kids call themselves a “hockey player” or “baller”.
They were kids who were athletic that played many sports. Now they (and parents) label themselves.
Not good.
This! No better time than during adolescent brain development 16-23 yrs to build the necessary resiliency skills required for what’s next.
Tom Brady reveals the brutally honest talk he had with a Michigan sports psychologist that turned him from a benchwarmer into the GOAT.
Brady's transformation started with one change: the way he thought.
"I sit on the bench my first year, and I really had—I would call it—a lot of self-defeating attitudes and behaviors. I always had an excuse. 'Coach doesn't want me in there.'"
"I had a sports psychologist. His name was Greg Harden. I would go into his office every Tuesday, and he would say, 'Tom, I like you. You work hard, but you have a shitty attitude.'"
"'How about you start worrying about what you can control and stop talking about the other quarterbacks, stop talking about the coaches not putting you in.'"
"If they give you three reps, you do the best with the three you get. Quit bitching about you only getting three or you going in there with the backup receivers. No one cares.'"
"'You treat practice like it's a game. If you throw a touchdown in the two-minute in practice, you celebrate like it's the game.'"
Brady never approached it that way before. Then "sure enough" everything changed.
"Mmy energy started getting way better. I was bringing juice; I had the right attitude."
"Then all of a sudden, I'm bringing the juice, man. Every day, boom."
"That [mindshift] really helped me get better."
The road to 7 Super Bowl rings didn't start on the practice field; it started in that very office…
Wendy Glover retweeted
Canada went further at the World Cup than Germany, the Netherlands and Croatia — and made it just as far as Brazil, Portugal, Mexico and the United States.
For context, here are the approximate annual budgets of those national soccer federations, in USD:
Germany: $510 million
Brazil: $500 million
USA: $260 million
Portugal: $184 million
Netherlands: $164 million
Mexico: $140 million
Croatia: $60 million
Canada: $40 million
One country is clearly punching above its weight.
Proud of this team. 🇨🇦
Wendy Glover retweeted
So Norway had been getting a lot of love since winning the most medals of any country at the 2026 Olympics. But it's Norway - and it was winter. OK.
Then they beat Canada with Celebrini and Crosby to win the bronze medal in hockey at the World Championships this spring. Now - they're beating Brazil in soccer at the World Cup.
Success leaves clues. If you don't know much about youth sports in Norway - you gotta check it out.
This is an excerpt from an article on the Norwegian youth sports model.
"When I say that we're kind of broad and inclusive in children's sport, we're not anti-competitive. It's more that we, I think, have a cautious understanding of when and how to introduce competition, so it's done in a healthy way."
For hockey - I see areas that heavily promote early AAA and it's eroding the sport there. Too much, too early.
Let me be clear - there is absolutely a place for AAA in youth hockey. Where it's evolved to in how young it has gotten is not good for the sport.
It's not good for kids. It's not good for parents. It's not good for the health of our game.
Great decisions made years ago by USA Hockey and the hockey community lead us to gold medals at the Olympics this past winter (NTDP, ADM for example).
Decisions made today will lead to our success years and decades down the road. If there's one change our game needs to make TODAY, it's dealing with the narrowing of the talent pyramid at way too early of an age.
That's not anti-competitive. It's the right thing to do to be the best.
Usually if an adult played sports at some level they think they know how youth-adolescents should be developed.
If they were successful as a pro that gives them greater confidence that they are experts whether that translates into poor behaviour or a more chill approach.
Wendy Glover retweeted
For more context- here’s the ages of this year’s NCAA Men’s D1 2025-26 freshman class.
2004: 261 players - Age 21
2005: 148 players - Age 20
2006: 63 players - Age 19
2007: 34 players - Age 18
2008: 3 players - Age 17
(2003 and older: 14 players)
Once again, the @NCAA misses the mark. A five-year eligibility clock is reasonable, but this proposal overlooks two predictable consequences.
First, athletes and their advisors will adjust high school graduation timing so the eligibility clock starts later, pushing graduation closer to age 19.
Second, this creates a disincentive for academically advanced student-athletes who currently graduate at 17 and begin college coursework early while continuing their athletic development. Policies should encourage academic acceleration, not discourage it.
There also does not appear to be any grandfather clauses.
By the way, ncaa hockey players are among the highest graduation rates and academic success.
Wendy Glover retweeted
This may be the best (most important 🤷♂️) paragraph I have written in 25 years.
Wendy Glover retweeted
Another paper from our work on ID systems in performance sport. Open access so help yourselves. Thanks to Helen and Alan.
tandfonline.com/doi/full/10.…
