Cycling is a team tactic where we get the puck into the quiet zone while in the offensive zone, generally while in the corner. The most obvious use of this is…

Example of Cycling:

• F1 is moving along the wall up towards the blue line from the corner.  He/she doesn’t have a play and doesn’t want to risk throwing the puck into the middle
• As well D1 at the near side blue line is being covered by one of the opposing teams winger, and is not a pass option.
• Instead of risking the pass into the middle we spoke of, F1 puts the puck back down the boards into the quiet zone which he/she came from.
• F2 at this point is somewhere close to net front or near side post and is reading the play and anticipates what has happened. He/she jumps to that quiet area to retrieve the puck, beating the defender covering him/her in the process.
• The defender coming up on F2 is usually preventing him/her from walking to the middle once retrieving the puck.
• This seen, F2 puts the puck back into the quiet zone in the corner and re adjusts.
• While this has all played out F3 is sitting high in zone usually tops of the circles helping his defence and being a pass option.
• Now that F1 has been pushed up the wall and is high enough in zone it has allowed F3 to jump down and join the cycle with F1 replacing him/her as the high option.

The main issue with the cycle is still being able to create offense from it. You can cycle like this all day, on repeat like your favourite song if you like. But if you keep putting the puck down into the corner or below the goal line you are not going to create any scoring chances.

Here are a few options…

Creating Offense from Cycling Option #1:

• Let’s say F1 comes up, puts the puck back down the wall into the corner for F2.  
• F2 gets it and instead of following the cycle pattern he/she cuts back and skates in behind the net to the weak side of the ice.
• At the same time F3 sees this and reacts by getting to the net front as a pass option.
• So by cutting back and switching sides after only one cycle, F2 has now opened up new play options.
• Such as hitting F3 net front or making a bank pass to D2 on the point for a quick shot and tip play or rebound.

Creating Offense from Cycling Option #2:

• F1 is coming up the wall as before. F3 sees this and comes in underneath F1 and receives the cycle on the half wall near the hash marks.
• Now the cycle has become almost reversed and will switch off to be between F3 and F2.
• This forces the opposing D that would have been on F2 to have to choose to either stay on F2 or switch to F3. Creating a small two on one down low which we like to have and giving us a potential give and go play to get a good scoring chance.

This last one is a great way to break down the defence by making  them make a decision on who they are going to take. Which can create a domino effect of players trying to cover for each other opening up holes on the ice.

So cycling is using these passes, protecting the puck, keeping it down in the quiet zone and then trying to use some other tactics like switching sides or passing to the D or overlaps which each other, we discuss in an earlier video to open up more dynamic options you have off a cycle. You are going to create some offense and they’re  low risk plays, rather than F1 turn the puck over near the blue line in the grey zone which we talked about previously.

(Transcribed from How to Play Hockey: Our Minor Hockey Coaching Course.)