As various players announced commitments to Division 1 colleges in August, future recruits watched the news trickle in on social media.
Their main thought: "How do I end up doing that?"
The reality is that very few players commit to a school as soon as they become eligible. Most wait or don't get offers until later in their prep career. Many don't get an offer until juniors.
But for a select few freshmen and sophomores in high school, they will soon come up on their own Aug. 1 when they become eligible to receive verbal offers. Many more players will aim to be viewed favorably by college coaches as they hit their 15O year.
So, what should these future college recruits be doing to best position themselves for recruiting?
There's a lot. Here's a rough roadmap.
Skating in the summer
The fall has split-season hockey. The winter has prep and high school seasons. The spring is typically a time for split-season nationals, state festivals and playing some other sports.
The summer can feel a bit like the wild west. There's no set route to take.
One of the biggest debates is how much players should be skating in the summer. Answers vary, but one area college coaches emphasized was not to play too many games.
"Don't overdo it," Harvard men's associate coach James Marcou said. "I understand that kids want to go out to a couple of different events, but I don't think you need to do every single event. It's definitely important to do some things away from the rink as well."
The summer is full of camps. Whether it's for a USHL team, an NAHL team or an agency, players often strive to attend those. It's certainly worthwhile to attend one, but it can't be the sole focus of summer.
"Your investment in yourself is the most important thing," Merrimack men's assistant coach Jimmy Mullin said. "When you're investing in camps and tryouts, you're not investing in development. You're investing in skating by just playing hockey for eyes. They biggest thing that you can develop is your skating, your body and your attitude. I think there are a lot of places that kids get pulled at. USHL camps, NAHL camps, USHL combines, agency camps — all these different things. But in reality, the only thing that matters is your development on and off the ice and being a kid.
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"Don't run around camp to camp. Spend time focusing on your skating and spend time focusing on your body."
The main event for the summer is USA Hockey's Select 15, 16 and 17 Camps, which draw the best players in each age group from around the country.
Select 15 embodies that the most, as U.S. National Team Development Program players aren't at Select 16 and 17 Camp, making Select 15 Camp appointment viewing for college coaches.
"I don't put a ton of stock into summer hockey," Holy Cross men's assistant Castan Sommer said. "I think that the festival stuff is pretty good because you're getting the so-called best 15-year-old kids all in one place. But I don't take a ton of stock into junior camps. A lot of it comes down to what you're doing from Aug. 15 to April 15 when kids are playing hard and there's at least a little bit of structure."
Working out and having a plan
Youth hockey players grow up with a regimented on-ice schedule. Practices in the morning and at night. Games on weekends. It's ingrained in players from a very young age.
Off the ice, however, is a much different story.
"I was a garbage disposal growing up," Yale men's assistant coach Rob O'Gara said. "If it was in front of me, I'd eat it. That's certainly tempting for kids."
The extremely unfortunate reality is pregame snacks of Sour Patch Kids and Dunkin' donuts aren't going to cut it as players get older, making a nutrition plan important for early teenagers.
"I'm not saying every meal has to be structured out," O'Gara said. "But diet has to start becoming at least something you think about. Just getting an understanding of what fuels you best, what makes you feel good — it's learning about that stuff."
Another element of that is getting comfortable in the weight room.
"It's the time when kids are starting to be mature enough to start lifting safely and then adding mass and strength that way," O'Gara said.
Getting faster and stronger is required for U14 and 15O players looking to become college recruits. But there's something else that's become paramount, too: the mental side of the game.
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Mindfulness and improving overall mindset have become legitimate focuses for young hockey players over the last 20 years. That trend will only continue.
Hatching a plan that encompasses all elements — on-ice, off-ice, mindfulness — should be a priority.
"A plan that will allow them to get stronger and work on their game, get some time away from the rink and not just be hyper-focused on hockey," Marcou said. "Focus on some video and the mental side of the game. Some nutrition, too. Honing in on those things. Coming up with a plan that works for themselves individually because there are a lot of external factors that go into hockey now. The mental side, the strength and conditioning side and the video side are a big piece of development now."
Oh, and one other thing: avoiding burnout is key.
"Having time away from the ice is not always a bad thing," O'Gara said. "Especially the amount that kids are with a skating coach and a coach for this and that. You don't want to burn out. You want to be hungry once the season starts and these are all little pieces that will have you best prepared for when I'm really starting to dial in on you as a player."
Knowing the real competition
If we were to poll most kids with the question of "Who is your biggest competition to securing a college commitment?", the common answers would be other teams, other top players and teammates.
Former Northeastern assistant coach Jason Guerriero, however, believes in competing against someone different.
"They've got to stop competing against everyone else," said Guerriero, who's now the director of player development for USA Hockey. "The only one competing against themselves is themselves. That is all they have to worry about."
It's easy to get caught up looking two, three and sometimes four years ahead. Heck, isn't that what this story is all about?
But it's important to remain present and focus on performing your best in the here and now.
"Everybody gets caught up in the noise of the next two years and what ifs and this and that," Guerriero said. "Just be present where you're at right now. Be present in the team that you're at. Do what you can do to be a better hockey player, a better person each day. In the end, you hope that these things kind of go in your favor.
"The hardest part of all that is that you are going to fail more than you succeed and it's how you learn from your failures. You can do everything right and do everything that the crystal ball tells you to do and you might still not get a Division 1 offer and you might end up playing Division 3 hockey and that's OK."
That's where learning to face adversity comes in handy, which is something players often avoid by switching to new teams.
"You're going to be hit with adversity at some point and every time kids are hit with it, they're just jumping from one team to another team and they're never getting that full experience of dealing with it," Guerriero said. "That's part of your development — dealing with adversity and understanding that."
One of the big elements of a commitment is posting the graphic on Instagram and X. Just like in any field, it's easy for others to compare themselves to those celebrating such an achievement.
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This is where it becomes important to remember who the real competition is.
"We commit kids that are 21 and we commit kids on Aug. 1," Guerriero said. "They're so caught up in this Aug. 1, I have to tweet the commitment out. Who gives a (expletive)? I wish it was illegal for kids to tweet it out and no one knew because it would take the stress level out of all these kids. They wouldn't have to compare themselves to everybody."
