Four simple relationships that can open up more ways to solve the game
By Coach Barry Jones
IIHF Level 3 High Performance | USA Hockey Level 4 Performance
In Part 1, I introduced a question that has become increasingly important in my practice design:
What problem does this skill solve?
Rather than beginning with the movement I want an athlete to reproduce, I've been exploring what happens when I begin with the problem and leave more room for the movement to emerge.
That sounds simple.
The difficulty for coaches is what comes next.
If I don't prescribe the solution, what do I actually design?
How do I create enough structure to guide exploration without simply hiding the answer inside another drill?
I've found four words incredibly useful:
UNDER. OVER. AROUND. THROUGH.
U-O-A-T.
Not four techniques.
Not four answers.
Four relationships that give me somewhere to start.
From Movement to Relationship
Imagine a defender's stick between the puck carrier and where they want the puck to go.
As a coach, I can probably think of several techniques that might solve that problem.
But before naming any of them, I can look at the relationship.
Could the puck go:
UNDER the stick?
OVER it?
AROUND it?
THROUGH an available opening?
Immediately, the problem changes.
I'm no longer designing a task around reproducing one movement.
I'm designing around a relationship between the athlete, puck, space, opponent and opportunity.
The athlete still has direction.
They just don't necessarily have the answer.
That's the part of U-O-A-T I've found most valuable.
Prescribe the relationship, not necessarily the solution.
Reducing the Problem Without Removing It
Giving athletes complete freedom isn't always useful.
“Go and explore” can create just as little learning as prescribing every movement.
Athletes sometimes need somewhere to direct their attention.
Coaches need somewhere to direct their design.
U-O-A-T gives us both.
If I ask:
How many ways can you get the puck OVER?
I've constrained the problem.
I've removed UNDER, AROUND and THROUGH for the moment.
But within OVER there are still possibilities.
The athlete can change the puck's height.
Distance.
Trajectory.
Stick position.
Body position.
Speed.
Timing.
They can begin discovering how changing their actions changes the outcome.
I've made the problem smaller without necessarily making the solution smaller.
That's an important distinction.
U-O-A-T reduces the problem space without reducing everything to one movement solution.
Build the Lock
I've started thinking about these tasks as locks and keys.
The environment creates the lock.
The athlete needs to find a key.
Imagine the lock is getting a puck out of a congested corner.
I could immediately demonstrate the movement I think will work.
Or I could create the problem and give the athlete a smaller clue:
Can you solve this using UNDER?
UNDER becomes the relationship we're exploring.
But it doesn't tell the athlete exactly what the key looks like.
One athlete might pull the puck beneath a stick.
Another might change their body position first.
Another might manipulate the defender before accessing the space underneath.
The relationship is prescribed.
The movement isn't.
That creates a very different coaching conversation.
What did you try?
What happened?
What changed when the defender moved?
Can you find another way UNDER?
The conversation doesn't remove the athlete from the problem.
It sends them back into it with a slightly different attention.
Four Words, Different Problems
U-O-A-T isn't limited to puckhandling.
Once I started looking for these relationships, I began seeing them throughout the game.
A pass might travel THROUGH a seam.
A puck might be chipped OVER pressure.
A player might skate AROUND a defender.
A puck might move UNDER a stick.
And the same relationship can produce completely different movements depending on the information available.
That's important.
AROUND isn't a toe drag.
A toe drag might be one way of going around.
OVER isn't a particular chip.
A chip might be one way of solving over.
When we separate the relationship from the technique, we create room for more solutions.
That gives the athlete a larger movement vocabulary without the coach having to prescribe every word.
The Coach Can Still Know the Answer
This was an important shift for me.
Designing for exploration doesn't mean the coach suddenly forgets everything they know about hockey.
I might recognise the movement that could solve the problem before the athlete does.
I might even be deliberately designing an environment where I suspect a particular solution will become useful.
That's okay.
The coaching skill is deciding when the athlete needs that information.
Do I need to give them the answer immediately?
Could I change the problem slightly?
Could I direct their attention toward UNDER?
Could I ask what they noticed?
Could I let them try another solution first?
And if they're stuck, could I provide just enough information to help them continue?
The coach isn't disappearing.
We're changing where our expertise appears.
Sometimes it appears in our instruction.
Sometimes it appears in the problem we've designed.
A Scaffold for the Coach
This is why I've become more interested in U-O-A-T as a coach-development tool than simply an athlete-development framework.
It gives me a check when I'm planning.
If I catch myself designing a task around one predetermined movement, I can move backwards.
What's the problem?
What's the relationship?
Could it be UNDER, OVER, AROUND or THROUGH?
What information needs to remain for the athlete to recognise that relationship?
Now I have somewhere to begin.
And importantly, I don't need to become a completely different coach to use it.
I can still demonstrate.
I can still teach technique.
I can still use repetition.
I can still provide feedback.
U-O-A-T simply gives me another option before I prescribe the solution.
The framework gives the coach more structure so we can sometimes give the athlete less prescription.
Take It to the Ice
At your next practice, choose one movement you normally teach.
Don't remove it from your plan.
Just move backwards one step.
Ask:
What spatial problem is this movement solving?
Then choose one relationship:
UNDER. OVER. AROUND. THROUGH.
Build a simple problem around it.
Give the athlete an intention.
Then direct their attention toward the relationship rather than immediately naming the technique.
Instead of:
“I want you to perform this move.”
Try:
“Can you find three ways AROUND?”
Or:
“How could you get this puck OVER?”
Then watch.
What solutions appear?
What changes when the information changes?
What do athletes notice?
And perhaps most importantly:
Did they find something you weren't planning to teach?
Because that's where U-O-A-T becomes more than four words.
It gives us a way to design enough structure for exploration without designing every answer.
And for the coach, that might be the first step towards becoming more comfortable with something we don't always find easy:
Knowing possible solutions, while resisting the urge to give them away too early.
Coming Next: Calibration
Finding a solution is only the beginning.
In Part 3, we'll explore what happens when athletes begin changing the movement itself, how manipulating one variable can change height, distance, speed and outcome, and why I use a simple idea I call the Three Solution Principle to help athletes calibrate skills without prescribing one perfect technique.
About the Arthor
Barry Jones is an IIHF Level 3 High Performance Coach and USA Hockey Level 4 Performance Coach. His work blends ecological dynamics, nonlinear design, and athlete-centred leadership to build adaptive teams that thrive in uncertainty. He is also the developer of Task Sketch, a tool designed to support coaches in creating game-representative training environments.
