During his playing days, Minnesota coach Brett Larson joked that when it came to weight training, the focus was on just a couple tough heavy lifts.
The Gophers’ first-year coach has had a front-row seat to witness some big changes in weight training since he played defense for Minnesota Duluth in the early 1990s.”It was so different and now these guys are working out almost every day,” said Larson. “It’s a 20-25 minute daily lift, they’re talking about getting your nervous system fired up — I didn’t even know what that meant when I played — there’s a lot more science that goes into it now for sure.”
Hockey players are often given a tough label to shake when it comes to their athleticism. In fact, last season a popular social media video trend asked what sport hockey players would play “if only they were athletic”.
Around the Big Ten, however, there are players that have the numbers to show just how much athleticism they’ve got. Some of that athleticism is natural, but it’s also due to the changes in strength and conditioning knowledge over the years.
Minnesota strength and conditioning coach Cal Dietz said the old-school methodology of just getting bigger and stronger has changed. After starting work in the field in 2000, Dietz has been a catalyst for that change, publishing multiple articles in scientific journals on his athletic-performance work.
“Instead of heavy, heavy lifting all the time — it’s shifted to where we might lift weights fast,” said Dietz. “Instead of doing a heavy, heavy load where they can only get one or two reps, they’re moving weights extremely fast for three or four reps that they could do 10 times.”
Gophers sophomore forward Javon Moore, picked by Ottawa in the 2024 draft, stands out with impressive metrics which Dietz has seen through testing.
“With hockey players — some of them aren’t as smooth looking athletes when they’re running, jumping, and things like that,” said Dietz. “(But) for a kid that’s 6-foot-4, 215 pounds, he has a vertical jump in the upper 30 and we do a pretty strict vertical jump.
“Also, he ran the 10-yard dash at a 1.59 electronic time,” Dietz continued. “The fastest I’ve ever gotten was Phil Kessel at a 1.51. So you’re talking pretty extensive speed.”
Dietz also noted that Moore is a top-3 bencher for weight on the team, despite having the longest arms, and has top-3 pro agility numbers despite having some of the longest legs on the team. It’s a package of traits that stand out to the new Gophers coach.
“I really like the way Javon pushed himself, pushed the guys around him and he’s come back faster, stronger, and you can really see the results off the ice,” said Larson. “Now, I’m hoping that gives him extra confidence on the ice because we’re really trying to develop him into a classic power forward.”
As forwards like Moore are getting bigger, stronger and faster, there are defensemen like Wisconsin’s Jack Phelan training to match the athleticism. Phelan was listed at just 170 pounds when he was playing for the Sioux Falls Stampede, but the 2023 Detroit fifth-round pick now nearly tips the scale at 200 pounds.
Badgers strength and conditioning coach Tommy Inkrott noticed how Phelan continues to make progress through a lot of hard work that had him as one of the top tested prospects at the Red Wings development camp.
“Jack is our most improved since day one on campus and just keeps getting better,” Inkrott said. “Most people plateau, but he just keeps improving.”
Phelan says he’s always worked hard, but since coming to college he’s learned how to be a pro in the gym and pay more attention to nutrition, which has allowed him to take big steps. He’s seen it in a broad jump that was around 9 feet when he came to Madison and is now nearly 10. It’s also shown on his force-plate numbers that started around 18 and now are in the 20s despite putting on all the added weight.
“Watching the NHL, defensemen that I play similar to, they’re all 200-plus pounds, strong in the corners, but they’re also explosive, quick, powerful and mobile,” said Phelan. “We harp on being aggressive as a defenseman and shutting down plays down in the neutral zone. I think just having that extra power, that extra speed, the extra strength. I think you just feel a lot more comfortable in those situations. I’ve really improved on having a really tight gap and trusting my feet and I think a lot of that comes from the weight room.”
One thing that stands out when talking to strength and conditioning coaches on this topic is how much consistency matters in getting results. Ohio State strength and conditioning coach Taylor Brown sees those traits in Buckeyes captain Ryan Gordon, who has increased his scoring output each year with 3 points as a freshman, 13 as a sophomore and 23 as a junior.
“He has great intrinsic motivation that has driven his training intent over the years and has benefited from an on-and-off-ice perspective,” said Brown. “He’s a well-rounded athlete who has developed over the years in all areas that we have tracked and is at the top of our normative values. He stepped on campus as a freshman, eager to develop and build habits. He is an athlete who has taken advantage of the training environment and the resources we are fortunate to have.
“The biggest change is what hasn’t changed,” Brown continued. “His consistency and ability to train with high intent time over time, year over year, is what has allowed him to separate developmentally off ice.”
Brown noted that Gordon’s weekly force-plate numbers have consistently improved, up 23 percent from his freshman year and is in the top 1 percent of their normative values in this assessment.
While it might be harder to see just how athletic these players can be with their skates powering through the ice compared to the running and jumping we see in their Big Ten peers, these standouts show just how much athleticism hockey players can have.