This year the women, in preparation for the World Cup Qualifier later this month hosted China and The Netherlands! The number 1 and 2 teams from the 2008 Olympic Games! The reason for me to go out to Chula Vista is to work with the men’s program in a 2 week training block and playing international games vs Canada that is getting ready for the World Cup in India, happening now….

For me it always a welcome change from Maryland into working with the men’s national team! The game is faster, players are more skillful and it requires more tactical coaching. In March 2009 we lost the final of the Pan American Cup to Canada due to a golden goal. This loss meant that Canada qualified for the World Cup and we did not! Now almost a year later we would see where we are! Canada that should be ready to compete vs the best teams in the world was in there final stages and made the final roster cuts while in San Diego. The USA men’s team has no international competition in 2010 and so in a very different stage in the preparation! Fitness and overall sharpness of play should be in favor of the Canadiens!

Knowing this we build a game plan for the 4 game series that would see where we are at the moment! Focusing on improving and start preparing for the Pan American Cup in 2011, yes we do plan that far ahead!

The games were very even! Eventually we lost each of the 4 games but with the National Coaching staff we were very pleased were we were! The difference is that Canada could accelerate the game and had players in the forward line that could penetrate the circle and score goals! This resulted in simple more goals for Canada then for the USA and that is still what decides the game! Another big part was the penalty corner! The 3rd game that we lost 3-1 tells us all! USA 4 corners, no goals, Canada 3 corners, 2 goals. I can refer to an earlier blog which tells about the key components for a successful team, a corner, a striker and a goalkeeper is all you need!

With a very clear view of what to do in the next 17 months until the Pan American Games we were overall satisfied with how we played, not with the result… after all that is all that counts! Guess we will see in time if our satisfaction was right!

Next week a blog live from the World Cup Men in New Delhi, India where I will be attending the FIH High Performance Coaching Course…… getting new ideas for the 2010 World Camp Technical program….

Tjerk Van Herwaarden
Technical Director, University of Maryland  :::  UMD
Co-Owner, World Camp USA ::: World Camp USA
US Distributor of Princess T14 Hockey Sticks ::: Link

Unfortunately I can tell you! This season was a record breaking year for Maryland Hockey! We had our first ever undefeated regular season in Maryland Field Hockey history. We won the ACC championship and were 22-0 going to the final 4 in Winston – Salem, NC. This year the final 4 was going to be the best final 4 since I have been coaching at Maryland. UVA, Princeton, UNC and us were the best 4 teams in the nation in my opinion. All teams have great coaching staffs and are well structured and organized. All teams have individual qualities that could have a decisive influence on the outcome of a game.

We played to most thrilling semi final anybody could ever imagine! Playing Princeton (we beat them 3-2 in OT during the regular season) we knew it was going to be a high paced game! The first phase of the game saw us have the better opportunities and a few small chances to take the lead! It was however Princeton that scored first! I guess we needed that goal to wake up! We eventually took got a 4-1 lead at the beginning of the 2nd half! 4-1 up in a National Championship semi final, we are in control…. it seemed that Princeton did not really agree with us and with attacking hockey they got back to 4-4, we had to start all over again to build or even get a lead!

As coaches we know that with a tied score and limited time each goal can be the last one! The relief we felt when we scored the 5-4 was enormous! The games ended in 7-5 for us and the crowd was definitely the big winner! As a coach you can be happy with the 7 goals but not with the 5 against! It showed our weaknesses and we only had 1 day to get back in shape for the National Championship game.

The other semi final was another thriller eventually UNC beat UVA and so we were all set for Terps versus the Tar Heels on sunday for the 2009 National Championship.

UNC and Maryland are 2 teams that know each other well! Multiple videos are watched to scout the opponent and nothing is left unspoken before the game! Whatever we can control we do control. During the regular season UNC – Maryland was a well anticipated game, no 1 vs no 2 and both team were unbeaten at that time.

We had our tactical plan ready and we executed it well in the first half! We controlled the game and had the best opportunities in the first half! We outshot UNC 12-1 in the first half, score at half time however was 0-0. The start of the 2nd half saw the same play as in the first half! It was us that scored the first goal. Nicole Muracco broke the score with great shot midway the 2nd half. This goal eventually would lead into the craziest final phase of a game that I have witnessed. Very quickly after the 1st goal UNC game back and tied the game again. On a corner rebound we scored the 2-1 with just 12 minutes to go! At this time UNC had played with 10 players due to a yellow card and soon we were the ones that were a player down. UNC used the man up situation and even pulled their goalkeeper to give them a double advantage, their plan worked 2-2! The UNC goalie came back in the game and with just 7 minutes to go we had 11 v 11 and still a tied National Championship final. After our yellow card and the 2-2 from UNC we were not able to gain control back over the game! We could not control the ball and connect our passes! This made UNC stronger and while we were preparing the overtime line up. It was UNC that was awarded a penalty corner with just 12 seconds to go! 3-2 UNC…. With just seconds on the clock we could not do anything anymore, it was over!

And that is how I know how it is to be on the other side of all those great sports movies! Heartbroken players, disappointed friends, parents and  Terp fans. Seeing the other team celebrate while you were suppose to be the one… it hurts, it still does. The way we lost that game was extra painful, being in control and just seeing it slipping out of your hands in just 7 minutes is extremely hard. So close to the perfect season and just losing 1 game your entire season….

During the our entire season we scored at least 3 goals or more each game.. expect for 2 games.. our 2nd game of the season and the last one…

Losing is a part of the job that we have that nobody likes, we are suppose to really hate it but at the end of all the coaches we have only 1 can win. So I suppose the more important part is how to deal with a loss! Learn from it, know where it went wrong and change it! Make sure the same mistake won’t cost you the game again. Eventually that is the only thing we can do improving is the biggest responsibility of our jobs. Improving in all aspects, on and off the field.

Well, it was a good thing I waited a while before I wrote about that game!! I was in San Diego last week with the National team and people still ask me how could you lose that game…. I took me some time what he was talking about! I have my focus on 2010, a new class, a new season and a new challenge, I am looking forward to it!

I also have some interesting blogs coming up! Next week I will tell about the USA – Canada series! I just spend 2 weeks with the Men’s National team and will let you know how that was! The week after that I will be in India during the World Cup hockey for men! I was invited to an international FIH high performance coaching course and will share my experiences with you!

Let’s hope all off this snow will be gone soon, time to hit the fields again!

Tjerk

Tjerk Van Herwaarden
Technical Director, University of Maryland  :::  UMD
Co-Owner, World Camp USA ::: World Camp USA
US Distributor of Princess T14 Hockey Sticks ::: Link

And to get right back into it.. We went 23 and 1 on the season! And that “1″ was came only in the last game of our season – the NCAA Finals! We got through our season without a loss! The first ever undefeated regular season in Maryland Field Hockey history, something to be proud of, but in the end, it is just a statistic.

We started the ACC tournament with a bye in the first round. We watched Wake and Boston College play for a spot against us in the semi final. BC lost and we ended up playing Wake. We had a close game against them during the regular season and Wake and Maryland are always good and exciting games, it is also anybody’s game! We had a comfortable lead halfway through the 2nd half – but nowadays in college field hockey that doesn’t say that much anymore. It became a close game that we ended up winning after Wake just did not have enough power anymore to push for another goal.

The ACC final was a matchup between Maryland and UVA, two very different teams, each with very specific qualities, strengths and weaknesses. It was UVA who took a well deserved 2-0 lead with very well executed corners. We did not anticipate these corner options as we had not seen them before on any video of games earlier that season, and believe me, we watch a lot of video.

We called a time out with just 15 minutes remaining on the clock – something needed to happen, and it did! With a bumped up line up, we have a plan for when we are down and yes we do practice these situations, we got 2 goals back in regular time! It was going to need overtime to decide the 2009 ACC Champion. On the first corner in OT we played a variation from a drag flick into a deflection on the stroke spot height. The ball was slighty changed off direction and ended up behind the goalkeeper, Maryland 3-2 in OT.

Now it is always great to read about these come back victories but what happened that day was special for me! We didn’t play our best hockey and did not create the chances we normally do. During half time, Missy, UMD head coach, talked to our players and just asked them one specific thing; “play as if you have nothing to lose and play from your heart!” The energy that this simple question opened-up along with a different system (more attacking) got us back in the game! We will never be able to measure how much the impact of that half time speech on the team was, but it was incredible and gave us the spark that we needed.

Inspiration and belief are words we coaches use a lot but being able to use them only when needed most, and even more important, using them when your team will accept them is so vital!

Well, winning the ACC, and the way we did it was great!

If you want more inflo including game video – go to the UMD for ACC website.

Next week I will blog about the NCAA Final 4 and our season end, a whole different story…

Tjerk

Tjerk Van Herwaarden
Technical Director, University of Maryland  :::  UMD
Co-Owner, World Camp USA ::: World Camp USA
US Distributor of Princess T14 Hockey Sticks ::: Link

This is based on a normal schedule having 2 games in consecutive weekends.

Sunday       Game
Monday      Lift & Practice
Light practice for starters, with basic skills, corners and set plays. this practice is used more for recovery. The player that don’t see to much game time have  a harder practice with a lot of game components in it.

Tuesday is a Day off

Wednesday Lift & Practice
Wednesday practice is a fitness practice with technical and tactical components. The intensity is very high, full field flow drills, possession games, big spaces and separate sprints when needed. We normally split the group and have a defensive and offensive orientated drill build in the session.

Thursday    Practice
Just a 2 hour practice with a key focus on a technical skill in the beginning and the majority of the practice is spend on tactical concepts. We play big games (8v10, etc) to focus on outletting, pressing or tactical plans for the upcoming game.  A good 30 minutes is spend on attack penalty corners.

Friday    Practice
The friday practice is a light practice focussed on technical skills and finalizing the tactical plan for the game! When we can we play a competition day which has 2 teams playing each other in all different kind of competitive games, like shooting, strokes, 3v2’s, small games etc. To end the practice we focus on penalty corners again! This time we have seen the upcoming opponents defensive penalty corner on video and work on penalty corner we know we can use.

After practice on friday we have video! In the video session we look at 5 different areas from our opponent. Outletting, Pressing, key tendencies and attack and defensive penalty corners. We discuss our plan and strategy for the game during this video meeting!

On Game day we very briefly repeat the plan and play the game!

I hope this was interesting info for all the coaches out there!

See you all next week

Tjerk

Tjerk Van Herwaarden
Technical Director, University of Maryland  :::  UMD
Co-Owner, World Camp USA ::: World Camp USA
US Distributor of Princess T14 Hockey Sticks ::: Link

I guess the decisions we made as a coaching staff during pre season are working out very well… We have played very different games vs very different opponents and very different playing styles! The way we dealt with each team was different as well! But there is some consistency..

In nowadays hockey you need just 3 vital pieces to be successful!
1) A good Goalkeeper
2) A good Center Forward
3) A good Attack penalty Unit

A good goalkeeper will keep your team in the race when you are going to some tough times or even when your opponent is much better, a goalkeeper playing a good game can be your life saver! Her saves will give your defense confidence and as long as you don’t get scored upon, just 1 goal on the other side will give you a win!

A good center forward has a drive to goal, every reception and opportunity she has is goal orientated to create a goal scoring opportunity out of nothing is a gift and talent, cherish these people as they will decide the game for you… or against you! A very skillful center forward will get you that goal you need or will get the corner that will lead into the goal.

A good attack penalty corner unit is able to score goals even if your team doesn’t play well! The corner conversation rate is about 30%  and you have different options from your corner against different corner defense set ups.

Just 3 vital parts any successful team has… When you have players that qualify for being special in their area, gk, forward, hitter on corner, cherish these athletes and help them even making better at their talent! Don’t waste to much time with working on their weaknesses but help them excel with their talent, bring the best of their talent to your team.

At least 3 of our last 5 games have been decided by one of the 3! We had a great GK to keep us in the race with some key saves vs Michigan, we had a Center Forward that got the goals vs Old Dominion and a corner unit that executed well vs NorthWestern.

You need a whole team to be successful, don’t get me wrong but a GK, center forward or corner unit will be game decisive for you when you need it!

Wish you all good luck with your games! Till next week!

Tjerk

Tjerk Van Herwaarden
Technical Director, University of Maryland  :::  UMD
Co-Owner, World Camp USA ::: World Camp USA
US Distributor of Princess T14 Hockey Sticks ::: Link

Although we are 3-0, scored 12 goals in 3 games and only conceded 2 in the last game (7-2) there is definitely enough to work on! Why is 1v1 defense always so difficult, making decisions about closing space or going for the tackle seems to be very difficult for some players! Training topic for this week! Overall I am happy with decision we made as a coaching staff, we have to get more consistent and work on a couple of things but that is why the finals are played in November…

The season has started and coaches always say that the season controls your live! It does from time to time! We arrived back late monday night back from Chicago and we had Tuesday to work half a day (office) and take care of the personal things around the house! Today full day with office work, practice, meetings and video prep! Tomorrow the same thing, practice in the morning, some meetings afterwards and game prep! On Friday we have Old Dominion at their place and Michigan Home on Sunday! Great opponents and so a great weekend of hockey.

This sunday when we play Michigan we have a special celebration of the 1999 Maryland Field Hockey National Championship team. They beat Michigan 2-1 in the final that year and I believe almost everybody of that team is coming back to Maryland for that weekend! Former Terps from Germany and Australia are flying in for the weekend, for a party and catching up!

It’s going to be a great weekend!

Tjerk
ps. If anyone has any questions or wants to have an insight look of how it is to work as a NCAA division 1 coach let me know!

Tjerk Van Herwaarden
Technical Director, University of Maryland  :::  UMD
Co-Owner, World Camp USA ::: World Camp USA
US Distributor of Princess T14 Hockey Sticks ::: Link

Where on the first day of pre season it is new for everybody and we just have to start back up, after not even 2 weeks it is as if we have been here getting ready for the last 2 months! Where fitness and technical skills have had the priority in the first few days we now are  focussing on the big tactical pieces, outletting, our press options, Penalty corners and defense. Interesting for coaches is this new rule of the self start! Your press cannot be the same and it adds so much more to your options in outletting. From a coaching perspective I love it, it requires us to think and be creative with options and lots of great discussions with the coaching staff. Do we step up, or take a more defensive approach to it? What would benefit our team more and how would the players deal with our strategies and philosophy ?

Right now we feel that we have a solid plan and are able to provide our players with a good plan on how to press and how to outlet using the self start! I guess we will see this weekend if we are right with our thoughts….

Another interesting piece of this year is that we have a significant change in our team dynamic. In the past we always travelled with all the players on the team, this year we don’t! For every away trip we will select just 18 players which means some players will stay behind in College Park. Call it the economic crisis in College Sports…

The team has been doing great with this but tomorrow after our last session before we head out we are going to name the 18 for the opening weekend! It really is a tough situation to be in as a player, especially the freshmen but certainly also from a coaching perspective! Sport is very unfair, let me be very clear, some players will work as hard as they can every single practice but still come up short, some players just are talented and gifted and can do with half the work to still be on the field! As a coach you want to win, so what do you do? I know, it is a very tough situation!

It is decision time for all of us! And the only test to see if you are making the right decisions is the game! I will let you know about our decisions when we come back on monday!

Tjerk

Tjerk Van Herwaarden
Technical Director, University of Maryland  :::  UMD
Co-Owner, World Camp USA ::: World Camp USA
US Distributor of Princess T14 Hockey Sticks ::: Link

I have always felt extremely lucky being raised in one of the best Field Hockey countries in the World, hockey is all around and it gives enough options for watching great games or learning from the next coaching course or seminar. It was great to see and know that especially on the women’s side the Netherlands is still on top of the world! The 2008 Gold Medal in Beijing and now the Junior World Cup Title. I guess we must be doing something well in our country.

On Saturday we watched the USA play China for the 7/8 spot! It is always great to see some of your own players play in a international tournament representing their country! Another reason to feel proud! The stands were filled and everything was perfectly set for a great afternoon of top hockey and cheering on the USA. The game did however not give us too much reason to cheer! It was very clear that the 2 weeks tournament has taken its toll on many of the USA players and China had the best of the last game of the day. After 8-0 for China fortunately the USA could get some cheers after scoring twice in the final minutes of the game! I was too bad that their World Cup had to end like it did! With great pool play and close games to Australia, England and Korea they deserved more! But I guess that is part of sport, you always get what you deserve at the end….or not?

In the mean time we have almost finished our first week of pre season! We played a scrimmage yesterday vs Northeastern and without 3 U21 players it means that a lot of Freshmen are able to get some minutes on the field! As a coaching staff it finally will tell you if your thoughts and hopes of certain players are where they should be!

We did well, after just 4 practices and some short tactical meetings we were definitely able to get a structured team out there. NU was well organized and fit as well so after 70 minutes of play in our first game we went into overtime… Thankfully we got lucky with a great intercept and counter attack after just 3 minutes of play to get the win.

Well, off to week 2 in pre season, a lot of 2 a days this week! I will let you know how that went next week!

Tjerk

Tjerk Van Herwaarden
Technical Director, University of Maryland  :::  UMD
Co-Owner, World Camp USA ::: World Camp USA
US Distributor of Princess T14 Hockey Sticks ::: Link

This pre season is also different then other pre seasons! We do not yet have the whole team complete… 3 of our players are representing the USA at the Junior World Cup in Boston. It is always great when college players can represent their country and especially when it is at an event in the USA. With Maryland it will not be 2 a days this coming weekend, we still have very early practices but we are actually visiting the Junior World Cup in Boston with the team along with scrimmages vs College teams in Boston over the weekend!

A weekend full of top International hockey and getting the Terps ready for season! Doesn’t get any better than that! I will report back with a new blog after the weekend to give a quick roundup from the World Cup!

As players and coaches hopefully will read this blog I wanted to share with each of you; Good luck in the next weeks! We are all starting with Pre season and it will mean hard work, sweat, great successes, disappointments, tears but keep that goal in mind! Striving for an overall great performance as an individual and a team. Winning that last game late in November…. that’s why you have to put in the work right now! Work hard and enjoy it as much as you can!

Till next week
Tjerk

Tjerk Van Herwaarden
Technical Director, University of Maryland  :::  UMD
Co-Owner, World Camp USA ::: World Camp USA
US Distributor of Princess T14 Hockey Sticks ::: Link