How To Line Up For Faceoffs In Hockey
Faceoffs are an important part of the game of hockey. Winning faceoffs is a team effort, learning where to lineup will make a huge difference.
When taking a faceoff you should have your center at the faceoff dot, your two wingers on the hash marks of the circle, and your two defenders supporting your wingers by standing behind them at the bottom or top of the circles depending on which zone you are in. This will slightly change depending on where you are on the ice. Offensive zone and defensive zone faceoffs will change where you stand.
Read on to find out more about lining up on faceoffs and where you should stand depending on the situation that your team is in.
Where To Stand For A Neutral Zone Faceoff In Hockey
The Neutral Zone faceoff is the most straightforward of all of them. This is a good place to begin. The neutral zone has 5 total faceoff dots. One in the center of the ice, two on it’s right and two on its left, just before the blue line.
Usually, in a neutral zone faceoff, you line up in a very neutral way. You are not too aggressive and you are not too defensive. This is a shared space and you don’t want to be too aggressive and give up a nice scoring chance. But, you don’t want to be too defensive and give up an offensive chance.
When you start a neutral zone faceoff at either of the 5 choices that you have, We have always lined up in the most basic setup with the center at the dot, the wingers on their respective sides, and the defenders on their respective sides supporting their forwards.
However, if you want to be super aggressive in the neutral zone you can always try lining your winger up at the far dot. Take a look at the picture below and you will know what I mean. This involves moving your defender up to take the spot of the aggressively placed winger, but if you win the faceoff this will definitely give your winger more space to work with if you can get the puck over to them.
Where To Lineup For A Defensive Zone Faceoff In Hockey
This is probably the most important faceoff setup that your team should discuss. This way everybody understands who is responsible for who. A defensive zone faceoff loss can cause a huge scramble if you guys don’t know who should be covering who.
Most of the time on the team I play on, we use a pretty standard defensive zone faceoff. We obviously always have our center at the dot. The side in which the faceoff takes place will change how the rest of the team will line up.
We will always stack in front of our goalie.
If the face-off takes place to the left of the goalie, we have our right defender stand at the hash mark, and then our right winger stands right behind him. We have our left defender stand at the bottom of the circle, just to the left of the goalie.
But if the faceoff is to the right of the goalie we have our left defender stand at the hash mark with our left winger directly behind him. While our right defender stands directly to the right of the goalie at the bottom of the circle.
If we lose the faceoff, it is the winger’s responsibility to attack the points, these are usually the other team’s defenders.
But if we win the faceoff the wingers need to read the play and decide what kind of breakout you guys are doing. If you want to learn some common breakouts that will help your team, check out this article.
This isn’t the only defensive zone faceoff lineup there is though. You can always set up with both of your defenders on the hash marks with your wingers supporting them. This faceoff setup works great as long as everybody knows where they should be and what they should do. I got this setup from Jeremy Weiss and it makes a lot of sense.
In this setup, if we lose the faceoff it is the right-winger’s job to attack the person who touches the puck first after the center man. He should skate hard towards the blue line regardless of win or lose.
The left-winger will make a read, if we lose the faceoff he needs to attack the Left defender on the other team.
The right defender should always try to take away a shooting lane while also taking the right-winger of the other team.
Left Defender should retreat back to the front of the net in the case of the loss.
If we win the faceoff, it’s the left defender’s job to control the puck and ring it around the boards where the left winger should be waiting for a break-out pass.
Where To Lineup For An Offensive Zone Faceoff In Hockey
We have a guy on our team who is really good at winning faceoffs to his 4 and 8 o clocks. So we always post up with an aggressive stance in the offensive zone ready to take a quick shot off of the faceoff.
You can have either winger move into the shot-taking position.
Lots of times though we set up in a very traditional face-off set up. This is more of a neutral/ defensive approach to the face dot.
If you are in standard face-off set up in the offensive zone and you win the face-off what do you do next?
Well, if the puck is won to the defense, as a forward, you should either try to crash the net in hopes of causing a deflect or getting a rebound from a shot or try to get open for a passing option and create some space. You have some options in this position and you need to either have a good hockey IQ and read the play or come up with a game plan as a team.
If the centers tie each other up, it is your job as a winger to get the puck. If the face-off is to the right of the goalie this is a great chance for the left winger to swoop in and pick up the puck while the right-winger crashes the net. Vice versa, IF the face-off is to the left of the goalie it is the right-winger’s job to get the puck.
How To Get Better At Faceoff In hockey
Practice! The more face-offs you take, the better you will get. But there are a few things that can accelerate this learning.
- Work on timing
- Grip your stick lower
- Get your center of gravity lower
- Work on set plays with your team
Work on the timing of the puck drop. Get to know the refs at your rink, how do they normally drop the puck? I’m sure they will have a few tells. If you can follow the puck better than your opponent you greatly increase your odds of winning a face-off.
I have always liked a low backhand grip on the stick. This will help you be stronger on your stick. This way your opponent can’t lift your stick or knock it off of the dot easily. This is also true about your center of gravity. The lower you can comfortably get your center of gravity the harder you will be to knock off the puck.
Tell your teammates what your plan is. Are you going to tie this guy up? If so, let them know. That way they can expect to take off hard at the dot and crash the net in unison. A set face-off play can definitely be a huge advantage in beer league hockey. Work on a few with your team and you guys will crush it.
Where Do I Stand For Hockey Face offs?
The most traditional face-off set up for beer league hockey is having the center on the faceoff dot with their wingers to the left and right of them on the hash marks of the circle and their defenders supporting the three forwards by standing between them and their own net.
The center can be surrounded by their wingers and defenders in various patterns depending on where the face-off is taking place on the ice. There are more aggressive setups and more defensive setups. Use situational awareness to determine which is best for your team at that given time.