How to Score More Goals in Hockey: 10 Tips to Score

How to Score More Goals in Hockey: 10 Tips to Score

In this guide, we will break down exactly how to score more goals in hockey. The following tips can be applied at any level in order to find the back of the net more. Using data from the NHL, we will dissect how the best players in the world rack up their goals season after season.

How to score more goals in hockey

Tip 1: Develop a Shooter's Mindset

Wayne Gretzky, one of the best to ever do it, said it takes six shots to score a goal. Elite goal scorers in the NHL possess a shooting percentage between 15–20%. A good rule of thumb, if you want to score, is to aim for eight shots in a single game. There's often a correlation between the top goal scorers in the NHL and those leading the league in shots taken every year.

Bonus Tip: Take a Non-Emotional Approach to Scoring Goals

Here is a good tip from skills coach Daryl Belfry when it comes to the mindset of the elite. A lot of players will get frustrated when their first, second, or third shot doesn't go in. Keep shooting the puck with confidence, knowing that through the law of averages one will finally drop. Your shooting percentage will even out eventually, so if the first eight don't go in, do not let it derail you. I have seen players take 10 shots that don't go in, and then all of a sudden 11, 12, and 13 go in, resulting in a hat trick. Keep shooting!

Tip 2: Create More Scoring Opportunities Without the Puck

Working on your play without the puck is something to be considered if you want to score more goals. Realizing the effort that precedes a goal is often neglected. Skaters are required to beat guys up the ice, join the rush to get into a prime scoring area, and make plays in motion to jump into a soft area where they can get the puck back in order to shoot.

Where goals are scored in hockey

Tip 3: Go to the Net and Stop

Going to the net and stopping there is a key habit that all young players can start building into their game. With the majority of goals happening at the front of the net, players should shoot to score in practice and, instead of doing a fly-by, downshift and bury any rebounds or loose change as a result of their initial shot on net. Sometimes it is the second or third opportunity that eventually beats the goalie.

Tip 4: Watch More Hockey

Next time you tune into a game, don't just watch the puck as it moves around the ice. Isolate a single player and see the areas they move to without the puck in order to generate a shooting opportunity. Often, they will go a whole shift without touching the puck, but timely arrival in the right areas allows them to get a quick shot off from a teammate in a sneaky area within the defensive coverage.

Tip 5: Play Inside the Dots

Most goals are scored inside the house of the rink. At every level, players that play on the perimeter struggle to produce. Stand in front of the goalie and be willing to pay a price, even if it means taking a cross-check or a slash from a defender. Tipping pucks, rebounds, and quick shots in the slot are all great ways to put the puck in the net.

Tip 6: Finding Quiet Ice

Building off of our last tip, we want to let the play develop and play to where the puck is going. Forwards will often come in and out of areas such as the high slot and find themselves in the quarter pie of the circle at the right moment, where there is a breakdown in coverage. Here is a great example of Auston Matthews finding quiet ice in the quarter pie while the Rangers are completely puck focused.

Tip 7: Improve Your Shot and Work on Different Ways to Score

Whether you're playing youth hockey or professional hockey, the best scorers have one thing in common—they can beat goaltenders in a variety of ways. A quick wrist shot, deceptive snapshot, one-timer, backhand, tip, rebound, or backdoor finish all become valuable things to have in your arsenal.

Bonus Tip: Shoot the Puck Hard!

Every time you shoot, off ice, in practice, or in a game, shoot the puck as hard as you possibly can. When you do this, you are conditioning yourself and developing muscle memory so that when you get the puck in a prime scoring area, you bury it through the back of the net.

Bonus Tip: Shoot in Stride

A good way to score more goals is to practice shooting in stride. Hockey players have a tendency to set their feet when they are about to shoot, which is telling everyone on the ice what is coming. Work on being able to shoot quickly without needing to load the puck or wind up.

Bonus Tip: Get Good Around the Net

We already discussed above how a lot of goals happen around the net in the offensive zone. Players of all ages should get really good at finishing around the crease. This includes finding loose pucks, wraparounds, and tips. Skaters should also work on the simple stuff that happens all the time, like backdoor passes.

Bonus Tip: Find a Way to Handle Everything in Your Stick Zone

At the highest level, guys are really good at corralling everything in and around their stick zone. Work on catching pucks in your skates, on your backhand, and behind you, then get shots off toward the net. These are more realistic than catching straight tape-to-tape passes. In a game, be ready to handle anything—the saying is true: you can't give a good player a bad pass.

Tip 8: Outsmart the Goalie

Quick releases, shooting through defensemen, and angle changes are all good ways to confuse and throw off the goalie. Goaltenders are going to line up square to the puck. Every time it moves, their positioning shifts as well, manipulating their angle. Think about shooting while moving east-west, as well as pushing and pulling every time you shoot.

Bonus Tip: Study the Opposing Goaltender

When you move to juniors, college, or pro, teams will begin to pre-scout the other team and their goalie ahead of time. We used to have a heat map in our locker room that told us where the other goalie was weak and where teams were able to beat them previously, whether it was glove, blocker, five-hole, high, low, etc.

Younger players do not always have this luxury, but paying attention to the other team's goalie in warmups is a good enough pre-scout to gain this intel.

It is also important to pay attention to which way the goalie catches, as this changes your approach when shooting at a righty or lefty. If the goalie is a southpaw, everything is now backwards, and your approach to shooting might change.

Tip 9: Practice Like You Play

One of the keys to scoring more goals is to practice like you play. Every time you shoot a puck, on or off the ice, you are training yourself to score or training yourself to miss. Quality over quantity is important here. Players should practice shooting and converting on small targets or tarps where the margin for error is close to zero. In the NHL, goalies are almost always on their angle, and usually it takes a post-in shot or a near-perfect one to beat them.

Tip 10: Practice Missed Chances From In-Game Scenarios

A great final tactic to think about is to re-create opportunities or shots that you did not convert on during the game. Hockey is a game of patterns, and you will most likely see the same situation down the road, so it's important to be prepared for the moment when the time comes. Practice until you cannot get it wrong so that, in the future, finishing feels automatic.

Conclusion: Keys to Scoring More Goals 

At the end of the day, there is no magic formula when it comes to scoring more goals in hockey. It comes down to building good habits and repeating them over and over again. Shoot the puck with confidence, get to the front of the net, move without the puck, and practice the same situations you see in games. The more often you put yourself in scoring areas, the more goals you're going to score.

Remember, even the best goal scorers in the world miss far more chances than they score. Don't get frustrated if the puck isn't going in right away. Stay confident, keep shooting, and trust that the work you're putting in will pay off over time.

If you're struggling to score more goals or aren't sure what you should be working on, send us an email at info@prohabitshockey.co. We'd love to help!

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