Increasing wrist strength and training a player's top hand motor skills are vital to utilizing the top hand to its full potential.

Did you know that roughly 90% of the world population is right-handed while only 10% is left-handed? And did you know that the NHL breaks down to be about 60%-65% left-shots and about 35%-40% right-shots?

Even at the amateur level in Canada you’ll see hockey stick sales ranging around that 65% left-shot to 35% right-shot. Meanwhile in the USA that ratio is flipped where stick sales are 65% right-shot to 35% left-shot.

While choosing handedness is a never ending debate, there is no question the top hand is the most important on the stick. Let’s dig into why.

Hand placement

Hockey players have two contact points with the stick — their top hand and their bottom hand. Both perform different functions for stick skills and shooting. The top hand provides range, control, reach, and some non-obvious power, while the bottom hand provides stability and power.

Given their roles, the bottom hand is often referred to as the power hand, while the top hand is the control/finesse hand. Therefore, conventional wisdom says that if players have their dominant hand as their bottom hand tend to be better shooters because their dominant hand is on the power part of their stick. Meanwhile if a player has their dominant hand as their top hand tend to have better stick skills, such as puck handling and passing.

Top hand importance

The top hand controls the stick and controls the turning of the stick blade, allowing the blade to cup the puck to keep it flat and manageable. This is also vital during shooting as players control where they shoot. If the blade is open it will be high in the net and if the blade is closed, it will go low. This is directly controlled by the top hand. At the very end we will go over an advanced technique that is driven by the top hand and allows players to have more time where the blade is touching the puck and less time in the air.

Another key element is for shooting. Powerful shooting involves yanking the top hand back. The top hand creates the most important part of the lever, the farthest point. (For the science enthusiasts out there: work is the force times the distance, W = Fd). 

This is why taller players have historically dominated the hardest shot competition in professional hockey.

As you can see in the formula, the effort put into the top hand is multiplied more than the bottom hand. Here are some examples of players getting the most out of their top hand when shooting:

Clip of the day – Shooting, Top hand

Getting your hands away from your body is a foundation of quality stick skills

During a shot, the stick acts as a lever that transfers power into the puck

Watch their top hand as it gets in front of their body then pulled back. pic.twitter.com/rHiWN5xoEV

— Greg Revak, CFP® (@CoachRevak) November 11, 2019

Another reason why the top hand is so important is that it is often the only hand on the stick, whether that be in puck acquisitions, going stick-on-puck playing defence, or sometimes passing and shooting.

Sidney Crosby is a wizard with the puck and can been seen all over the ice with only his top hand on the stick. In the example below, he’s shooting and scoring with one hand. Although more realistic and applicable are the other one-handed things that are done by Crosby and other NHLers every game, catching and passing pucks.

Lastly, when controlling the puck, the bottom hand should be able to slide to where it’s needed and stay out of the way of the top hand’s range of motion. A soft bottom hand allows the player to easily slide the stick in their hands to provide a range of motion. Whether that avoid opponents checks or change the angle of a shot. When catching passes, the bottom hand should be loose/soft on the stick shaft. This allows for a ‘soft catch.’

Common mistake – Players that have their dominant hand on the bottom of the stick tend to over-grip the bottom hand. This makes catching the puck softly difficult and often is noticeable as pucks bounce hard off their stick blade.

Advanced technique: rolling out the back

Now we understand that the top hand is the most important, how do we go about utilizing it to it’s fullest potential?

Specifically for puck handling, I have an idea for you, straight from today’s top skills consultant, Darryl Belfry. This technique is called rolling it out the back. By rolling the puck out the back of the stick, players are able to have less time where the stick isn’t controlling the puck. It’s a small tweak, but I promise if you teach it to your players you’ll see amazing transformations toward better puck control.

There are many reasons why the top hand is the most important — harder shot, soft puck receiving, range of motion, puck control, playing quality defence, and knocking pucks away. Increasing wrist strength and training a players’ top hand motor skills is vital to acquiring the key elements that unlock the most important hand…the top hand.