Imagine the team you’re coaching running every system, every habit, every structure you’ve ever implemented in practice, automatically, almost without conscious thought. That would leave room for individual creativity to take over within the system of the structure you have taught as a coach. 

Is this possible? According to Dustin Donathan, yes.

Donathan, Head Coach of the Texas Christian University men’s hockey team, spoke at TCS Live 2023 on implementing automatic in-game habits to help players react without overthinking. This, according to Donathan, comes down to implementing two key concepts: visualization and rep management.

Donathan, who is also the Varsity Head Coach and Director of Coaching with the Mansfield Hockey Association and a heavily-read contributor to The Coaches Site, practices open-eye visualization during film sessions with all his teams.

“If you can mentally predict an event, it becomes nothing new. It becomes automatic.”

As far as rep management goes, Donathan doesn’t worry about how long good reps take in practice, he simply wants them done.

“I’ll write 15 on the glass and they know I’m asking for 15 good reps. It may take them four minutes, it may take them 10 minutes, but either way, it’s about the reps, not how long it takes.”

This 15-minute presentation features tons of tips for how you can successfully implement mental rehearsal and rep management with your team because in the end, when habits are combined with deliberate practice, mastery is achieved.

Noteworthy timestamps:

Timestamps:

• 00:10 Practice makes perfect
• 03:00 Automatic Habits
• 04:50 Visualization
• 07:45 Rep Management
• 10:00 Seeing Success