Plenty of hockey players work on their skating and shooting, but only the truly dedicated players looking to improve their overall game add passing drills to their hockey practice. The varieties are nearly endless and new passing drills can always be added.

Hockey Passing Drills Advantages

• Softer hands
• Quicker reaction
• Improved puck handling
• Increased confidence
• Better accuracy

Are Solo Hockey Passing Drills Better than Group Drills?

Hockey players can work on their passing drills alone or in a group, but group drills can be more fun and simulate the plays you make in a game. Hockey staples like the give-and-go pass, a deke and pass, or moving a puck rapidly around the ice, are passing drills that lend themselves to two or more hockey players. But with a little ingenuity or a training aid, a solo player can still work fun hockey passing drills into a practice. Rebounders and similar training aids can also be used to improve your hockey passing skills even when you don’t have a friend or teammate available. And when you’re alone, you can work on what you want, and work harder or longer.

Practice Hockey Passing and Receiving

It makes sense that you’ll want to hone your hockey passing so that you can send a perfect saucer pass down the ice to a streaking teammate who has beat the defenders. The ability to put a crisp pass on the stick of a teammate who has an open net opportunity is key to your game. Don’t forget to practice receiving passes, and not just the perfect blade-to-blade passes—the passes you receive won’t always be right on the mark, so your ability to adjust to a bad pass is important. Spend plenty of time receiving passes to develop the soft hands needed to receive a pass and control the puck. There’s nothing worse than working your way into position and the center threads a pass through traffic, leaving you with a simple snap shot for a goal, only to have the puck bounce off your stick to a defender who quickly clears the puck. Incorporating pass receiving drills into your hockey passing practice will improve your overall game and boost your scoring chances.

Training Aids for Hockey Passing Drills

Hockey passing drills by yourself can be difficult, but there are a variety of training tools that can make your training time more efficient and productive. Don’t hesitate to use these tools to improve your passing, pass receiving, and reaction to passes.

One tool that may help your passing skills is the HockeyShot Extreme Passer, which allows you to send a pass into a rubber band, which shoots the puck right back to you. The training aid comes in several variations, including one with a shooting board. By using two of these tools, you can set up one on each side of a goal and pass to one, receive the pass back, stickhandle, and then pass to the other, or take a shot. This simulates game situations where you may not have a shot, or a teammate might be open for a better scoring opportunity. You can also use this tool to simulate the give-and-go, by passing into the device as you skate toward the goal, then receive the pass back and wrist it into the net.

Another product that can help you improve your hockey passing skills is the Snipers Edge Pass Master, a triangular device that three players can use at the same time. This tool can be used on ice or as part of your dryland training, and allows you to work on your hockey pass with plenty of reps. It can also be used alone like other rebounding trainers.

Whether you’re working with other players or by yourself, hockey passing drills not only improve your passing skills, but also help improve your all-around game on the ice.