Devan McConnell - High Performance Director for the Arizona Coyotes - Episode #217

Episode #217 features Devan McConnell, the High-Performance Director for the Arizona Coyotes. From his earlier days working with Mike Boyle to developing his High Performance Model at UMASS, to being a leading expert in high-performance sports, Devan shares invaluable insights and advice for athletes of all levels.

Explore the intricate world of athletic development and the crucial role of passion in sports, guided by Devan's remarkable journey. Gain insights into the delicate balance between specialization and holistic approaches, as well as the progressive use of sports science in shaping modern athletes.

Whether you're a budding athlete seeking inspiration or a seasoned sports enthusiast, this episode offers a masterclass in achieving greatness on the glacial battlegrounds of professional hockey.

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Transcript

Speaker 1: 0:00

Are goalies the best athletes on the ice surface.

Speaker 2: 0:02

Maybe the best athletes in the world, really do believe that hockey players are some of the best athletes in the world across the board and I think the best goal tenders, in all honesty, at this day and age are some of the best athletes on the team.

Speaker 3: 0:14

You're the most decorated racquetball player in US history, world's strongest man, from childhood passion to professional athlete, eight-time Ironman champion. So what was it like making your debut in the NHL? What is your biggest piece of advice for the next generation of athletes, from underdogs to national champions? This is the Athletes Podcast, where high performance individuals share their triumphs, defeats and life lessons To educate, entertain and inspire the next generation of athletes. Here we go.

Speaker 1: 0:44

Hey, this is episode 217 of the Athletes Podcast, featuring Devin McConnell, the high performance director for the Arizona Coyotes. As we mentioned during this episode on a couple occasions, we're powered by perfect sports supplements. If you haven't tried them yet, ap20 is the code Save 20% at checkout. Everyone loves being able to buy protein and save money. I know I do. Why not get the best protein in Canada? Number one flavors on the market, like Canadian maple flavored protein, is my favorite. Check it out. Let me know what you think of it. I guarantee you will enjoy it. This is an incredible episode with Devin. As I mentioned, he manages all aspects of sport and performance for the Arizona Coyotes, where he's managing, ultimately creating and implementing systems, workflows, as well as ultimately reporting and facilitating informed decision making amongst multiple stakeholders within the organization. He also developed his high performance model at UMass, so we dive into a couple of those different hats that he wore during that time and, honestly, this is an incredible episode. He's a goalie. I'm a goalie. We had some fun. Maybe that's because I'm a little weird, who knows. This episode was a doozy. I appreciate you folks for tuning in to the 217th episode of the Athletes Podcast. We're in Miami. The hair's a little wet. It was raining, but we got this episode coming to you. Hope you enjoy this episode. Thank you, folks, for tuning in to 217. Here we go.

Speaker 1: 2:02

We get to learn a bit more about Devin McConnell on the Athletes Podcast. The author, a goalie, the high performance director for the Arizona Coyotes currently, but you're also a goaltender, devin, and you're also coming here on your birthday today. So first off, we need to give a big birthday shout out to Mr Devin McConnell for coming on the Athletes Podcast. Thank you for being here today, educating, entertaining and inspiring the next generation of athletes. I have a first question that I want to kick it off. We've featured dozens of goalies on the Athletes Podcast. You see me wearing the in-goal mag shirt right now. You're a goalie yourself. I want to hear it from the horse's mouth Are goalies the best athletes on the ice surface?

Speaker 2: 2:44

Maybe the best athletes in the world, I mean that's the honest.

Speaker 1: 2:47

There we go. That's what we're looking for.

Speaker 2: 2:49

Let's get cut straight to the chase here. No question, goaltenders are the best athletes, definitely on the ice, and they're, for sure, up there across the board.

Speaker 1: 2:58

It's crazy, isn't it?

Speaker 2: 3:02

I mean in all honesty, when you think about what one. I think ice hockey players in general don't get enough respect in just sort of global athletics from an athletic ability standpoint. It's the old. You know you're on a. You know skating on knives with a. You know a four foot long stick trying to control a puck and people are trying to kill you and all those things. You know skating 24 miles an hour.

Speaker 2: 3:28

You add in, obviously, everything that we have to do is goal tenders. That's so unique to the position, our skating ability is so different, our movement are so different in the crease. You know, obviously, hand-eye coordination and all of those things. So I mean, we like to joke and have fun, but I really do believe that hockey players are some of the best athletes in the world across the board and I think the best goal tenders in all honesty at this day and age are some of the best athletes on the team. There's no question we see that with a lot of our guys in our organization that they're just fantastic athletes, fantastic movers, and that's what athleticism is all about.

Speaker 1: 4:12

We can just end the conversation there. That's all I needed to do. No, I sincerely am excited for this conversation. Obviously you've got an extensive background in the high performance sport science kind of area discipline, high performance discipline. I should say Maybe let's let you kick off by sharing your background in sport. Obviously we've covered that you're a goal tender, but what other sports did you play growing up? Where were your interests? What got you into Stanford and teaching and learning under Mike Boyle, and how have you begun to get into the fitness, health and wellness space? And then I'll probably ask some questions in there to dive deeper.

Speaker 2: 4:47

Yeah.

Speaker 2: 4:47

I mean life long goal tender. I started out my early hockey career as a little kid. I started out playing defense but like a lot of kids, I thought I was in love with the gear. My dad was my house coach so he had the set of traveling gear that we rotate around the team and I just remember being at home in the garage or in the basement and I was probably six or seven years old and just being in love with that stuff we're talking old deer hair pads and stuff like that and putting them on and just having fun. So I started as a defenseman but quickly realized that I just absolutely loved everything about being a goalie and the gear, the masks, just everything. I loved it. So I became a goal tender.

Speaker 2: 5:35

I was probably full-time goal tender I don't know nine or 10, somewhere in that kind of ballpark age range and I grew up in Seattle Washington, which wasn't necessarily a hockey hotbed. But almost all of my minor hockey experience was in British Columbia. All of our leagues and everything we played was kind of the lower mainland Vancouver area. So I kind of grew up in the Vancouver area really from a hockey perspective and went on and played junior hockey. A couple of different places, ended up playing college hockey in the Boston area. So I went to school out there and that's where I sort of transitioned or my kind of career path obviously transitioned but certainly wasn't good enough to play professionally at any kind of real level. So when I was in playing college hockey I was really fortunate in that the school that I ended up going to it's called Fitchburg State, now Fitchburg State University, it was Fitchburg State College. I went there purely for hockey. Like it was the best opportunity to play right away. I'm looking at the roster, several places I was sort of looking at and being recruited to. That was the best opportunity to play right away. That's why I chose there. But they happened to have an exercise science program and, if I backtrack a little bit, I had always been really interested in sort of training, physical fitness, whatever you want to call that as a kid, as a teenager, purely to be a better hockey player but be a better goalie, like I was. Always I didn't love to work out, to work out. I realized that getting stronger and faster and stuff like that, even though I didn't necessarily have a great understanding of those things as a kid, it made sense to me that that would help me be a better goalie. So I was always kind of into that.

Speaker 2: 7:24

And then my last year of junior hockey I was pretty beat up, pretty banged up and kind of limping through the season and spent a fair amount of time in physical therapy just to kind of keep the wheels on throughout the season and realized that I was kind of really interested in learning about the human body. So I was kind of interested in training. Then I started to have sort of a academic interest in the human body and physiology and anatomy. And then I happened to get into this school and be recruited to play hockey at Fitchburg State and they happened to have an exercise science program. So I went there for hockey. But I had to pick a major and I was like, well, working out training physical therapy is kind of interesting. So I went into that undergraduate program with this sort of outside goal of becoming a physical therapist, if I'd fast forward a couple of steps from there.

Speaker 2: 8:13

While I was still in school did some volunteer work internships, apprenticeships, whatever you want to call them in physical therapy. I spent some time in physical therapy clinics and just kind of volunteered, kind of shadowed, trying to figure out what this is all about and pretty quickly realized that what I was really interested in was not necessarily rehabilitation and working with injured populations as much as I was really interested in sort of the performance side of training. So that's where, from a career perspective, I sort of took a right turn and realized that performance training strength and conditioning was something that I was really interested in and really at the time still didn't even know that that was an actual job, like to be a strength coach. We didn't have a strength coach at the college at the time, so I was still on the outside trying to figure out what is this space? Is this something that I can do?

Speaker 2: 9:11

And that's where you mentioned Mike Boyle. For anybody listening, mike Boyle is one of the most well-known kind of strength and conditioning coaches really in the world and he happens to be out of the Boston area long time at Boston University, boston Bruins, boston Red Sox, super well known in my space and got lucky and ended up doing an internship working for him and realizing at that point this is still during my undergrad, I think this is after my junior year completely realizing this is what I want to do. It's not physical therapy, this is actually a job. I can actually do this. I could work in sport, I could. Hey, they have these people in the NHL. Holy crap, I could maybe work in the NHL someday. So that's really where that sort of career path sort of took me, and then it's sort of I've just kind of grown from there and taken different steps throughout my career.

Speaker 1: 10:02

You and I both have one thing in common Neither of us were good enough to play professional sport. Do you know why swimmers are bad at sports science?

Speaker 2: 10:13

Why is that?

Speaker 1: 10:14

they can't resist diving into the wrong pool of data. You know there was some fun moments in here that I was listening in. I'm like this is crazy to think, because you join this purely out of a passion and now you're working with the top organizations in the world of hockey and You've, like you said, mike Boyle is still a legend. He's on the Mount Rushmore of Strength and conditioning across the world. Was there a pivotal moment or like a paradigm shifting moment for you, whether it was training with him or whether it was in school that you're like, ah, like this is why I want to do this.

Speaker 2: 10:51

I know it was the performance piece, but like Any other specific moments, like out of game where you saw something occur or anything specific stand out, I mean I think I don't know that there was One moment, but I think it was sort of the realization as I was kind of getting into the field and, you know, working, working under Mike, or even, you know, when I went back after the internship, my coach at Fitchbridge State, let me essentially be sort of a player coach and start training the team and doing things like that. And what I really gravitated towards and I still Is the reason I'm still passionate about what I do is I love helping. I Love helping other people reach their potential. Like if I hadn't gone down this road, it literally I think about this all the time some of the other schools that I had I had been recruited to had no exercise site Like whatsoever, like one of the schools, the. The last school I was really sort of interested in was Fully, a business school, like everything with business and finance. If I had gone there I would have Gone down that road probably, but the reality is that probably somewhere along the line would have become a coach of some sort in. In all reality, I actually Almost became a full-time goal-tenning coach instead of a strength and conditioning coach, and it was literally Just timing that pushed me in one direction or another.

Speaker 2: 12:16

My my goalie coach growing up was a guy named John Carato. John Carato so I grew up in Seattle. He had moved out there sort of on a whim, became a goalie coach. So I kind of grew up with John. He was from Boston so at some point he moved back to Boston. He started working for a guy named Brian de Corp. So when I'm back Going to school in Boston I reconnect with John, who then connects me with Brian, and so I I train under Dak and John and I work with them on there.

Speaker 2: 12:47

And when I graduated Dak was opening a new facility that had a gym attached and he basically Said hey, do you have any interest in sort of running this facility to get to train? Do the off ice training? You get to run all the on ice training. I was literally interviewing at the same time at Stanford University for their strength coach position and that offer came before Dak got back to me, otherwise like I'd be a goalie coach like that. So I Kind of I went down sort of a rabbit hole. But what really appealed to me, and still appeals to me, is that it's it's coaching, it's teaching, it's helping people Realize their potential, whether it's in the gym or it's on the ice, like that was just a matter of circumstance in all reality. But that's that's what still sort of grabs me to this day.

Speaker 1: 13:40

Yeah, you put an emphasis on developing a culture that is forward-thinking, collaborative and detail oriented. I took that from your LinkedIn so I won't take credit for it, but your focus is a, as a leader, is providing your staff with support and resources to empower them to utilize their expertise. This fosters a departmental vision of collectively working in harmony toward common, measurable goals, and it would stands out to me. There is the fact that you wore a ton of hats in your previous roles, where you were not just the sports scientist but you had every other role, basically all encompassing at what I believe was your previous at the college level, correct? So then, when you made the jump to the NHL, having to only wear one hat probably made things a little less stressful, but a little bit more difficult to manage with a group. And I'm paraphrasing here but, like, take me through that jump from college to pro additional resources, maybe Pros and cons of not being able to make decisions yourself and having to rely on others, like what was that whole experience like?

Speaker 2: 14:39

Yeah, it's actually interesting. I've spent a lot of time recently because I have I've sort of pivoted in my career where I'm now in more of a leadership management position. So I've thought back a lot about sort of the different stops, so the the main places I've kind of been over the course of my career. Stanford University was my first sort of you know, real full-time job out of college Obviously not hockey, but worked with some some high-level teams there. But I was a, a strengthening conditioning coach, like that was the role. And then I moved on from there to University of Massachusetts Lowe, where I was there for almost a decade, as I think at the end of my tenure there my title was head, head of hockey, performance and sports science.

Speaker 2: 15:24

Excuse me and then High-performance model and I can kind of detail because that was wearing a lot of hats. Then I go to New Jersey with the Devils where I become the director of Performance science and reconditioning. So now it's a much more specialized. So I kind of went from very from specialized in one space to very General from the perspective of wearing a bunch of different hats, to very specialized in a little bit different space, to now I'm back to being Very general as far as having oversight over a bunch of areas, but less, less hands-on in any of those. So it's been sort of an interesting transition. I think there's a lot of pros and cons.

Speaker 2: 16:09

So my time, at my time at UMass Lowe, was probably the most influential from a growth perspective because I did. I I Came in as a blank slate. There was no strengthening program there was, there was nothing. I was the first full-time strength coach there and I kind of grew myself very organically but to what I'd my vision of a high-performance department, meaning All of these different areas sports, science, strengthening, nutrition, sports psychology, sports medicine. You know all of these different sort of Disciplines, disciplines, these different spokes off of a wheel, so to speak. Well, at UMass Lowe I wore most of those hats, like I was obviously the strength coach, but that's where I started to get an interest in sports science, so I started to integrate that I we didn't have nutritionists, so like I handled all of what that entails.

Speaker 2: 17:02

I'm by no means a sports psychologist, but when there isn't one, you're the person the athletes come and talk to and you kind of learn to deal with that. I did a lot of the rehab. We had an obviously athletic trainer, but as soon as people were out of the acute phase Whereas you know here they spend time with the physical therapist is sort of the interim person at Lowe. That was me. So I wore all these hats which Allowed me. I think. As I sit now in my role I've had experience in all these different places. I'm probably an expert in one or two of them, but I'm a, I have a general understanding of a bunch of them. So now my role is not necessarily to do all of the hands-on work of the strength coach or of the nutritionist, but it's to lead those, those individuals or those departments To sort of bring everybody under the same umbrella and kind of follow the same North Star. So that's kind of. That's kind of how that Trajectory is kind of ebbed and flowed over time.

Speaker 1: 18:04

The, the neo-generalist serial specialist. I've heard it referred to as yeah, exactly.

Speaker 1: 18:10

Yeah, I asked the track team about their research method methods and they just said it was all about the long run, so I'll I'll stick with learning yours. I'm curious what was From you having a decade at UMass, a couple years at Stanford, now with the Devils as well as the Coyotes? I'm curious if you see any specific Themes with the top performers at each level, whether it's collegiate, professional youth. Obviously we're trying to educate, entertain and inspire the next gen. I want to be able to give actionable tips to these youth that are listening to these conversations and say, hey, if I want to get to that next level, I need to focus on XYZ. And maybe it's not like I don't want to go as broad as saying Just have confidence and work hard. Are there those specific things that stick out between the high performers on a daily basis? And I want you to even go as deep as the data that you see, right, because I know you're a data junkie too.

Speaker 2: 19:03

Yeah, I mean I think the first, my first sort of answer to that the best hockey players that I've had at any level, or just athletes like even when I didn't work necessarily in hockey early on, they're almost always the best all around athlete, regardless of position. Again, goaltender player like I had Conor Hellebuck in college. Conor was, he's obviously an all world, one of the most elite goaltenders in the world, but I can tell you that in college this guy, pound for pound, is one of the strongest players on our college team and he worked, he was diligent in the weight room. Those general attributes of athleticism help carry over into his technical game and allow him to do what he does from a technical perspective on a very broad base of athletic ability. Same thing with our best forwards. Clayton Keller is our all star here with the Coyotes. He's a tremendous athlete. He might be a better golfer than he is hockey player and he's an all world hockey player.

Speaker 2: 20:26

That doesn't just happen by accident. Certainly you can be gifted to be more athletic than others, but all of these people that I've seen work really really, really hard in all aspects, in any aspect that can contribute to their ability. To me, another layer of that what that comes down to is passion. All of the top performers I've ever been with are so passionate about their craft that it borders on insanity in all reality. The amount of time they spend thinking about what they do, working on what they do, taking care of their bodies, taking care of their minds, all of these things, those are the things For kids. Passion has to be there. I truly believe that I have young kids that are starting youth hockey right now, and there's lots of parents that push their kids really, really, really hard and they're at every 5 am extra skate and they're doing all these things. Yeah, at nine years old, the kid's pretty good, but you can already see that he just hates it.

Speaker 2: 21:46

He hates it. It's like he might be the best you know. In two years he's going to be the best 11-year-old to quit hockey in the world. Great, I don't know. That doesn't seem to add up to me. There has to be passion. That's going to be in some people and not. But being able to foster that, I think, is super important. Then building general athletic ability. I'm a big believer with kids in playing multiple sports, in doing multiple activities. I think that that's super important. Again, I talked to 90% of the players at this level in the NHL, especially if they're North American. They grew up playing doing different stuff. Most of them do not specialize until they're 14, 15 somewhere in that ballpark.

Speaker 1: 22:31

We must have been drinking the same Kool-Aid here in the Pacific Northwest, because I try and preach the fact that everyone should be generally growing up and then maybe at 15, 16, 17, then you can specialize and be the sickest hockey player in the world. Until then, maybe you should learn how to play golf so that you can get on the links with Clayton Keller and JT Miller and then maybe qualify for the US Open during your offseason when you're not playing puck. To me, it seems like we've seen so much evidence guys like John Tavares, you name it that have gone through For youth. We need to be focusing on making sure that they have the ability to do whatever movement possible with their body, not just a right-handed slap shot and tip in. Anyways, that's my rant, for that I appreciate you bringing it up, because it's something that I'm passionate about as well.

Speaker 1: 23:15

I saw you post on LinkedIn. You can tell that's my favorite social platform. Jordan Trester, phd, frames the idea of high performance department being a group of individuals with sub-disciplines having domain expertise in their area. That's what you touched on earlier. Why is it that hockey players are so good at golf also?

Speaker 2: 23:36

I think there's probably similarities in the movement patterns. I think it's certainly a big piece of that. I think good hockey players are very competitive people. Good golfers are very competitive people. I think that golf is such a. Once you get to a certain technical level, it's such a game that is between your ears. I think the same thing occurs the higher up you go in hockey, and obviously especially as goaltenders. The reality is it's such a mental game that I think that that feeds into what makes you good at golf or good on the ice is the ability to handle those things.

Speaker 1: 24:20

It's interesting. Mike Ivera, who's a coach basketball trainer down in LA, who coaches some top NBA players, like Fred Van Vleet, for instance, he said that hockey players are also the best athletes in the world. I wanted to confirm that with you because obviously you guys are on the same strain there. You're also a member of the executive board of the Strength and Conditioning Association of Professional Hockey. When you take on these roles, you're obviously exposed to an incredible amount of data, information, potentially biases. How do you sift through the information that you're provided, come to your own conclusions, take in other people's opinions? What's your process look like throughout that whole kind of rigmarole, if I call it that, for lack of a better term. But did you also know, folks, that water is critical to health and vitality? Sadly, few of us drink enough of it. Let's face it, as good as it is, water just sometimes isn't that exciting.

Speaker 1: 25:16

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Speaker 2: 26:26

The way that I think about sports science and data. I try to work backwards. So I try to understand or try to have a question in mind. Let's say it's in terms of predicting future ability with prospect level players like looking at combine data. You have to have a framework in mind that you believe in, that says that from a in this perspective, from a physiological perspective, these are some of the thresholds that most players who reach a certain level or perform at a certain level can reach.

Speaker 2: 27:09

So one of the things that I've looked at a lot over the course of my career I believe that for players that skating speed is really important. Generally speaking, faster is better. There's obviously exceptions to that, but it's hard to say that you know if a guy is really fast, that he's you know. Do you don't want to take a look at him? So I try to work backwards and say, okay, look at the fastest players in the world or the fastest players that I've, that I've had in my systems. Uh, from a physiological perspective, what are some of the things that they can do? So, from a sports science perspective, one of the tools we utilize a lot are force plates, so we can analyze not just how high does everybody jump? But how much force do they produce? How quickly do they do it? You know all of these. There's a million different things you can look at. But you start to work backwards and say, okay, the fastest guys I've had uh in on my teams, uh, or in my systems. They've all sort of been able to produce this output on a force plate. So this is sort of a threshold that we can start to look and it doesn't. It doesn't mean that if we look at a player at the combine who does not meet that threshold, that that player is not a good hockey player or that that player might not be able to be fast, or maybe they are fast, but for a different reason. But it starts to tease some of these things out.

Speaker 2: 28:25

And I start to, when we're trying to develop these frameworks from a data, uh data perspective to better understand our athletes, um, it's working backwards from sort of uh, a question that we've had what makes a player good at X, y or Z? And then we try to look at what are the tools that we have access to or what is the information that we have access to. That can start to paint a picture. And really it's all about probabilities because, again, there's always exceptions, especially at the highest level. There's a lot of exceptions to the rule, but if you have some underlying rules to be able to base decisions off of, you can start to make more informed decisions. And that's really what the data in sports science is all about. In this high performance environment, it's about trying to make more informed decisions. It's not the only piece of information that we're going to utilize, um, but it's. It's a piece of the puzzle. That's what, for me, that's what data is all about.

Speaker 1: 29:22

Um, I I'm wearing this as I talk, wearing a loop strap where I'm totally given data all the time, and I want to touch on that point. But there was just a study released around golfers driving distance, and I don't know why I'm focusing on golf this episode, but we are, um, and it talked about two specific strength capabilities, that being a mid thigh pole, as well as your jump, uh, the amount that you're able to generate of force are basically the two indicators for how far you can drive the golf ball. Are there similar movement patterns that hockey players should develop that are like the key contributors towards speed power that you would recommend in the gym?

Speaker 2: 30:01

Well so. So I think that that's a great example because, um, the mid thigh pole for anybody that's not uh familiar is, uh, basically a measurement of, uh, maximal force output. It's it's a way of, you know, think of like a one rep max squat, while it's a safer way to assess that quality, basically. And then vertical jump amongst a bunch of things you can look at, is is, um, a measurement of power output, which is basically force over time. So how fast can you apply force? So neither of those movements look anything like swinging the golf club, right, but physics is physics, anatomy and physiology are anatomy and physiology. So the more force a golfer can produce um during their, during their swing, the more force they can apply to the ball in their swing, the further the ball is going to go, assuming you know angles and trajectory and and technique and all of those things. So those two measurements are measuring how strong or how much force the golfer can produce and how quickly can they. They can produce that force, even though those aren't in the same movement pattern as swinging a golf club. They're very general indicators of physical output. So the golfer is taking um that physical output of strength and power and then they're going to the range and they're working on the skill of applying strength and power in rotation. So that's why those two things will matter in golf uh, for driving distance, even though they don't look like golf, those two things matter very much in hockey for the exact same reason in skating speed. You know, basically locomotion is physics the harder, the more force I can produce down and back into the ice.

Speaker 2: 32:00

Pull. An opposite reaction means the more force on my body is going to be propelled with forward, that's the mid thigh. Pull in that circumstance would be assessing force output. So the stronger you are, the bigger your engine is. Vertical jump Okay, again, it doesn't look like skating, but it's how fast can you apply that force? So if an athlete, hockey player, skater, can apply more force faster and they have relatively good skating technique, they're going to move faster on the ice than somebody that can't. Um, no different. For a gold tender, those two measurements would be hugely valuable. Um, from a, from a gold tending perspective, your explosiveness moving around the crease, even though, again, they don't look like playing goalie, they're general characteristics of anatomy and physiology and biomechanics. That then the gold tender goes on the ice and works on goalie skill and technique and applies that bigger engine into what they're doing from a technical perspective.

Speaker 1: 33:03

Such a better way of articulating it than I did and you hadn't even probably read the study yet. But, um, one of the things you mentioned there, uh, talking goalies, players we just had James Wenland on the podcast, who I know you're connected with as well, and one of the things that I'm curious about constantly, athletes are being spoke to. You know, spend more time in the gym, get bigger, get stronger. He mentioned the fact that once you get to a certain weight ie the average weight of the people that are playing that position will just stick. With goal tenders, for instance, the benefit of getting bigger and stronger starts to hinder you. So my question would be how am I, if I'm a 17 year old gold tender who's trying to get stronger, increase my mid-dive, pole and vertical jump, but I'm not supposed to get any bigger? Do I start manipulating caloric intake, micro-macronutrients, the training modalities, recovery, like how are you maybe working with the best athletes in the world to ensure that they don't gain a crazy amount of weight or don't lose out on their performance?

Speaker 2: 34:06

Yeah, I think that question's a little bit Too broad no, not broad, but a little theoretical versus practical. From a very so 17 year old goalie, I could be very confident in telling you I have never had a 17 year old athlete in any sport, in any position, that has gotten to that point where they are strong enough, explosive enough, fast enough, maybe big enough, like maybe, but probably not from a body composition. I haven't seen a lot of 17 year olds that are 8% body fat and 200, yeah, not often there's an exception, I'm sure but so that 17 year old probably continue to get stronger, bigger. I mean, are you 17,? You weigh 120 pounds? Okay, you need to add some weight, but for the most part I don't worry as much about actual weight. With most of our athletes, especially at that age, continuing to get stronger and more explosive is going to benefit you.

Speaker 2: 35:16

Now, there's no question, there is a threshold for every sport, for every position, for every athlete. That you're strong enough, stronger is not going to be beneficial. We have some of those thresholds internally where, yeah, once you're at a certain you know, mid-thigh pole is not our tool of choice, but if it were, there's a certain level where, like you produce this much force, like more force for the purpose of being faster, more explosive, more agile not going to benefit you. Maybe beneficial if you're a stay-at-home dean, you need to knock guys around in the corner. Maybe your threshold is higher, right, but so we have those sort of broken down, but I can say, probably at 17,. Certainly in the hockey world we don't come across players that are maximized or optimized yet, but you do get to that point. Now, once you get to that point, that doesn't mean training stasis to exist, because you can still, over the course of the season, train to optimize certain qualities.

Speaker 2: 36:23

If body composition is an issue, that's where we would adjust nutritionally macronutrients and caloric intake and things like that. And again, I know enough to know that I've hired a really good dietitian that handles those things specifically. But certainly that stuff would come into play. But those are all the sort of those. Again, those are the data layers that we sort of talked about, of understanding. You know, are you strong enough? Yes, are you powerful enough, no, okay, then we're going to need to work in this area. Are you powerful, yes, but not strong enough? Okay, then we need to work a little bit more in this area or different things like that.

Speaker 1: 36:58

Okay, so you said your mid-thigh pole isn't one of the items that you track. Are you allowed to share some of the data points that you do track?

Speaker 2: 37:05

Yeah, we do something that's very similar. Instead of the mid-thigh pole, we do an, which is an isometric mid-thigh pole. We do an isometric belt squat. So really the only difference is, instead of pulling on a bar that's in our hands, that is literally at mid-thigh level, we have a contraption that basically we put a belt around the back of their hips and attaches to the floor and we do the exact same thing, it's just that there's no, the hands are not. There's no compression in the spine and the hands aren't involved. So it's the same concept. It's literally we're looking at the same thing. We're just picking a little bit different movement to do it that we've found in our population. It's just a little bit safer and a little bit more indicative of what they do.

Speaker 1: 37:49

Are you noticing that athletes with the I mean isometrics, plyometrics there's, I think, a case to be made to incorporate both into workout programs. Have you noticed that spinal work, like spinal compression, has been a factor amongst younger athletes who've maybe been doing a ton of compound lifts and maybe ended up doing a bit more spinal compression than necessary? Is that a factor? Should people be worried about that?

Speaker 2: 38:14

Yeah, I mean. So we do very little spinal compressive type exercises. You know, squatting essentially is the major contributor, back squatting. We don't. We really don't do any back squatting in our program. I haven't back squat. I've actually probably literally never programmed back squats in any of my programs in 20 years. We do a tremendous amount of unilateral work, meaning single leg exercises, single leg squats, single leg deadlifts, an exercise called the rear foot elevated split squat. We will do that one with a what's called a safety squat bar. So that does have a level of spinal compression but we're on one leg so the loads are much lower.

Speaker 2: 38:58

It's not uncommon at all to see athletes who have come up in a program or trained in a way that you know they back squat a lot, they're really heavy for really long times. Yeah, that can be. Unless you're exceptionally technically proficient, there's going to be wear and tear, especially the lumbar region, over time. That's just. There's compression to that area. The spine doesn't like that. So we'll have athletes. You know, obviously at this level we've got guys you know that have come from who knows where and done who knows what, and then we get them and they're here for two years and you know they may have issues from when they were, you know, 14 or something, but as far as what we program, we don't. We almost never program anything that would be considered compressive to the spine.

Speaker 1: 39:50

That's a super, super interesting. I'm glad I asked about that. I also know and want to highlight the fact that you're the author of Intent, a practical approach to applied sports science for athletic development. There's a reason why the past 40 minutes have been so insightful folks. You're also Volt Athletics Advisor. Is there anything you don't do, Devin?

Speaker 2: 40:09

Sleep. I don't sleep much, Okay so what?

Speaker 1: 40:13

okay, Given your knowledge background, you obviously understand the value of sleep. Why prioritize everything else other than that?

Speaker 2: 40:24

Oh, it's not that it's not a priority. I got two young kids and the NHL schedule doesn't allow for a lot of rest time during the season.

Speaker 1: 40:31

So, okay, okay, that that's fair and a reasonable excuse. Can you maybe share what you do to Ensure that you get good quality sleep during the times that you have the opportunity to?

Speaker 2: 40:43

Yeah, I mean it's, there's no real rocket science to Kind of sleep science sort of speak. It's things that a lot of us probably have heard and know. Um, routine is very important, which again is is really tough in season and impossible and in my setting but Cool dark room I personally I wear and I'm asking earplugs most of the time to try to Block out light and sound as much as possible, kind of put myself into a cave. You know there's different, you know supplementation strategies, depending on what's going on. Melatonin can be beneficial in the right circumstance. Um, you know those are all kind of magnesium very important. Most people tend to be deficient in magnesium, which has benefit in a lot of areas sleeping a big part of that. So those are all kind of the pieces. But yeah, in season in the NHL is definitely not conducive to to sleep schedules.

Speaker 1: 41:35

I'm in bed at 10 and up at 6, and I could not like. Now that I've got a routine, I can't stray away from it. I see how much it impacts me negatively. I gotta ask, though, our guys in the show being and adopting the cold plunge routine the same way everyone else on social media is, or is that already been Adopted in the past?

Speaker 2: 41:57

I we certainly use cold plunges. We program them for recovery all the time, depending on, depending on what's going on. I'm sure that some players do some stuff on their own at home. We only get to see him for a few hours a day on a practice day, um, but yeah, I mean cold, cold plunge, cold water, immersion, water therapy in general is a big piece of the recovery puzzle.

Speaker 1: 42:21

So that brings up an interesting point, because I also saw on a post work out. That's my favorite thing. I also find that helps with sleep. But you just mentioned the fact that you only see guys for a couple hours per day. How the heck are you able to manage? We'll call them super responsible athletes who are very dedicated to their craft, I'm sure, in always doing everything possible to be at 100%, but you can't control them. These are adults, human beings. They also suffer from their own, maybe vices or desires to source out other things. How do you manage that on a day-to-day basis when you're responsible at the end of the day for them?

Speaker 2: 43:01

Yeah, I mean, it can be a challenge. It's like you said, these are adults. We're, you know, one of the differences between working in the college setting, the pro setting. In the college setting, you're the coach that is leading the team, leading the group. At the pro level, you're, you know, really, you're more of a colleague with them.

Speaker 2: 43:21

So how do we control it? We don't control it, but we Develop relationships with the athletes to hopefully be able to have frank conversations, frank discussions around Whatever it may be. We provide best practice, we provide education, we provide resources and then, at the end of the day, they make the decision to do what they feel is best for them in their career, on on a daily basis. And that is what it is. And I would say, most of the time, in honestly, in my experience, nhl players, you know they, they realize what's on the line from a game-to-game perspective, from a career perspective, from a financial perspective. You know they're incredibly hard-working, dedicated, driven athletes that that know what's right and what's best for them, and I would say Most of the time that that's what they're doing.

Speaker 1: 44:20

Yeah, no, let's get to here. I also have noticed an incredible increase, or, like Frankly Connor, ingram's play has just been phenomenal this year, and I think that was something I did want to mention, and I don't whether you can attribute all of your work to that, but it seems like you guys got off to an insanely hot start. Whether that's travel, beginning off season, it's obviously a young team that's coming up. The last question we wrap up with on with our guests is we asked the biggest piece of advice for the next generation of athletes. Obviously, as someone who spent nearly two decades in the space, worked with hundreds, if not thousands, of athletes, I'm sure you could provide another couple hours worth of insights, knowledge, wisdom for our team. But if you were to leave them with one piece of advice, whether it's supplementation, whether it's hard work, whether it's any of the above things that we've previously mentioned, I'd love to give you that space to share that. Devon McConnell, on your birthday today.

Speaker 2: 45:15

Well, that's quite the question. I mean again, I would say I Would say to any young athletes listening the most important thing is is passion. If you absolutely, if you truly love the game, love the position, love what you do, then You're going to want to put in the work. It won't be. You have to work hard. You will work hard because you love it.

Speaker 2: 45:44

That being said, once you're in that space, understand that at this, at this level, the amount of the amount of work, again, in all of these areas, in in strength training, in recovery, in you know technical training, in you know nutrition, in everywhere, if you really want to be, you know what I say, what I used to tell players the difference between being a guy who plays hockey and a hockey player.

Speaker 2: 46:18

The hockey player, everything about their day is about being the best hockey player they can be. Everything they put in their mouth when they go to sleep, you know when they're in school, like how they're taking care of their school work so that they're prepared. You know to go to practice, how they prepare for practice, like, at this level, what the one thing that stands out to me is that every the athletes don't leave anything to change. Everything about their day is about optimizing their ability to play the game, and that's the biggest thing to take away. If you really want to be the best that you can be, whatever level that might end up being, realize every single thing in your day matters. There's nothing that that you can point out and say, well, that doesn't have anything to do with Hockey or was sported with my position. Everything does.

Speaker 1: 47:10

I.

Speaker 2: 47:11

Love it.

Speaker 1: 47:11

I just had to pause for a second. Let everyone make sure that that sinks in. Okay, I have a follow-up to that, because we have a minute and you keep sparking thoughts. Is there someone that comes to mind when you think of, like that person that you just described there that does all of those things, and then To who were your inspirations or people that you looked up to growing up? And then I promise that's it. I.

Speaker 2: 47:32

There's something that comes to mind. I mean, honestly, it's what I see, it's I'm very fortunate and that that's what I get to see every day, like from the time our players come in in the morning to the time they leave, and I know the things that they do when they go home to practice, to think, or to you know they go see you know cognitive therapists, or they go work with a you know another Massage therapist or whatever it is like every little little bit. So there's not one person that comes to mind. It's really it's what I get to witness kind of every day. That that's so, that's so impressive, and I forget what the second question was.

Speaker 1: 48:07

I know no inspirations or people that you like looked up to growing up. I'm sure if you were Pacific Northwest were you watching KD and his super song. Extra is either what.

Speaker 2: 48:15

You know what? Honestly, I was never. I was never a huge basketball guy. I was pretty much from day one. I was just dialed into hockey. But my, my hero, my kind of Inspiration. Growing up I was a big Felix Poppin guy. So Felix the cat was, that was who I wanted to be. Yeah, good choice.

Speaker 1: 48:34

Hey, it's okay, basketball players Don't make good sports scientists either.

Speaker 1: 48:38

Always jumping to conclusions. Nice, there you go three puns in one episode. Devon, I can't thank you enough for coming on the show. For those watching you can also listen to in gold mag. You were on episode 60, something of them as well, I believe it was. That's where I was introduced to your work. I can't thank you enough for coming on the show on your birthday. Like I said, tons of wisdom nuggets in here. It can't thank you enough for your time and we're gonna end this recording but for those listening, thank you so much for tuning in and it's going to be another episode. We'll see you guys next week, but this one was a doozy with Devon. Thanks again, man.

Speaker 2: 49:13

Thank you you.