Paul Cannata explains how youth hockey has changed

Former Milton Academy star Chris Romaine (left) with Paul Cannata. (Milton Academy)

Paul Cannata recently ended his 20-year career as the Milton Academy field hockey coach. During that time, he has had a front-row seat to the best preparatory hockey in the country.

He’s also gotten a front-row seat to how the hockey landscape has changed, and not just at the coaching school level.

The level of young people has also changed quite a bit during his 20 years.

On the latest RinkWise podcast, Cannata sat down with the host Stephanie Wood to discuss those changes, as well as the state of prep hockey, his own career and what’s next.

Here are some of his most insightful responses to youth hockey.

About parents who manage expectations

Booze:“Referring to some of the best hockey players, you’re like this kid is 15 years old? and you see it now from both sides women and men. This level of ability in all areas has improved at the elite level. And now it makes you warn that not everyone in the game is an elite player. We know for sure that not all players reach a high level no matter what they do. It is just the way it is. There’s a reason they call it elite. Also, I was watching the NHL draft recently and I was looking at the rankings and I see some kids going sixth and seventh, which is still phenomenal. But the stats tell you that your seventh round pick… the stats say what they say. And knowing how good those kids are and how good they were two years ago or still are, it’s hard. We all have to be careful with parents, coaches, etc. to find that balance where we’re going to give you a quality program, but be realistic about where this can lead. Most people I’ve found are [realistic]. A lot of people get it. But it all ruled.”

About high-level coaches who coach youth hockey

Booze: “On the positive side, you look at some of the youth practices and if I walked into Merrimack College on a certain night and you look out there and say they’re doing some really good things. Much different than 20 years ago. But where’s the expectation? What’s the reasonable expectation? Both the youth and at the high school level. Kids are coming into high school and most of them have had really good coaching. Whether it’s private coaching or they happened to have high level people on their club team. The expectations for your typical high school coach, no matter where they are, are much higher than they were years ago. Is is that fair? That’s a good question. I guess it’s not fair in some ways. These people aren’t full-time coaches. They can also be teachers, they can do other things.”

About the business of youth sports and its effects on other sports

Booze:“Youth sports is a multi-billion dollar industry. People used to say we used to walk to the park to play sports and then we took our bikes a little further to another field and then we drove cars and now we fly to youth sports. That’s much more true for baseball kids. Another positive-negative. New England baseball players are doing much better than they were 15 years ago when they were playing at the Division 1 level and getting drafted and all that good stuff. But now they fly down in October or November to Florida to pitch in front of ACC or SEC coaches. Not the worst thing. But what does it cost financially to fly to Florida for the weekend? And the other part of that is now some of the kids that don’t play soccer or football now because they have to play baseball in the fall and they don’t play hockey in the winter. It’s no different that our football players no longer play JV hockey in the winter. They play indoor soccer on the grass. Lacrosse players no longer play JV hockey because they play indoor lacrosse on grass. It is positive that baseball, football and lacrosse athletes are getting better with this type of access and this type of training. But we lost those other aspects of maybe the versatility of those kids and all kids.

Will we see the decline of the versatile student-athlete?

Booze: Definitely saw a tilt in the ability of the better players, both women and men. No question. Just like the wow factor of watching a musical performance or seeing some of the better athletes on the levels. But yeah, you just can’t… you have to make a decision. Families listening to this now, there will come a time when your child is 10, 11, 12 and you want to play soccer in the fall, but you have a Jr. Terriers game at 2 and a club soccer game at 2:00. at 2 in September. We didn’t used to start hockey in September. We do now. I understand that these rinks, these people’s real estate in this area is expensive. So if you have a rink running, you use the Foxboro Ice Center, you have a serious bill. The beauty is also that the Foxboro Ice Center has three ice rinks that I am involved with in the summer that provide three sheets of ice 12 months a year for our hockey players. It’s fantastic. But how do you play football and hockey? You can’t at some point. And then baseball and lacrosse get mugged and you have to make decisions, unfortunately.

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