Sense Arena could be a game-changing training tool for goaltenders around the globe
Coyotes purchased systems for Darcy Kuemper, Antti Raanta, Adin Hill, Corey Schwab
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Antti Raanta’s two children pose separate challenges when he is trying to squeeze in a high-tech home workout. His daughter Evelyn (nearly 4) would rather use her dad’s latest toy for her own purposes.
“She doesn't want to do goalie stuff,” Raanta said. “She wants to swim with the sharks.”
Eleven-month-old son Lukas presents more of a physical challenge.
“There have been a couple of close calls when I was doing the training and the youngest one is crawling around,” Raanta said, laughing. “I have to pick the right time of day when he is taking a nap so I don’t harm him.”
Let’s be clear. Raanta is a responsible dad. He always watches where he steps or slides. When he is engaged in one of those workouts, however, his reality is different from Lukas’. When he puts on his Sense Arena helmet, Raanta is looking at shooters, pucks his crease, his net and an arena.
Sense Arena’s virtual reality goalie technology hit the market last summer, offering NHL goalies, AHL goalies, and every goaltender below them a training tool that has been widely used by NFL quarterbacks for several years. No hockey position is more difficult to replicate game situations, but with Sense Arena, goalies can get valuable reps via virtual drills where they face screens, deflections, straight shots, shots of different speeds and elevations, shots off cross-ice passes and far more. There are sensors that goalies can hold in their hands or strap onto their gloves if they want a more realistic experience, or if they choose to use the system on the ice.
Sense Arena’s goalie system was four years in the making, and it is still evolving.
“I thought this would work so well for hockey because normally you have to be on the ice to learn, which isn’t always easy, like in Arizona,” said Sense Arena founder and CEO Bob Tetiva, who also offers a version for skaters. “When you learn how to skate and handle the stick, you have to know what to do and where to be. You can learn this through playing hundreds of games and watching video, but if you can experience the same game situations virtually, it should help speed up the process of learning, becoming better at decision making and better at reading the game.”
Once you are immersed in Sense Arena’s reality, there are a couple of viewing options.
“We bring the arena into their living room so that when they put the helmet on they appear in the crease, in an NHL arena,” Tetiva said. “They see the net behind them and they have two options: select drills that are animated so they can see game situations and face screens, angles, work on box control, or the other option is real video of real shooters, real players so they can work on their shot reads (based on blade angles, a shooter’s hands and shoulders, etc.) and things like that.”
Sense Arena’s goalie system costs about $1,700, which includes a $99 monthly fee that covers service, software, updates and new drills, which arrive every other month. The system is already being used in training centers around the hockey-playing world, and the list of notable goalies who have the system is growing.
NHL
Philipp Grubauer (Colorado), Keith Kinkaid (New York Rangers), Mackenzie Blackwood (New Jersey), Elvis Merzļikins (Columbus), Matt Villalta (Los Angeles), Max Lagacé (Pittsburgh), Eric Comrie (New Jersey), David Rittich (Calgary), Antti Raanta (Arizona), Darcy Kuemper (Arizona), Adin Hill (Arizona).
KHL
Roman Will (Chelyabinsk), Šimon Hrubec (Omsk)
AHL
Evan Cormier (Binghamton), Ian Scott (Toronto), Antoine Bibeau (Chicago)
ECHL
Jacob Ingham (Greenville), Zach Fucale (South Carolina)
Team Canada
Dylan Gerand, Taylor Gauthier, Devon Levi
Team Germany
Florian Bugl
Team Czech
Lukas Parik, Jan Bednář, Nick Malík
New Coyotes director of goaltending operations Brian Daccord was already using the system at his training centers for Stop It Goaltending, but when the Coyotes hired him, he brought the technology to Arizona. A few days before training camp began this month, Daccord said that Raanta, Darcy Kuemper, Adin Hill and goalie coach Corey Schwab each received his own system.
Kuemper hasn’t used his yet, but Raanta estimated that he had already used it between 10 and 15 times when I spoke to him on Friday.
“When we have days without skating you want to feel the puck a little bit, or see the puck,” Raanta said. “You just put on some socks and you can slide around a little bit. When you do drills with traffic where you have to move, you just have to clear the space for yourself so you don’t bump into the couch or anything like that.”
There are numerous benefits to Sense Arena, which Tetiva, Raanta and Daccord discussed.
“The biggest thing is you don’t have to go up and down all the time so the wear and tear on your hips, groin and knees is taken away because you can stay on your feet and still make the saves, work on reactions, follow the puck, get your angles right,” said Raanta, who has battled injuries the past three seasons. “That’s obviously a big positive.”
Daccord sees an extension of that benefit.
“Imagine what a valuable rehab tool this could be,” he said. “Usually guys don’t get many reps when they are rehabbing an injury. That’s a lot of time lost that you have to make up. With this, you can be in running shoes and grays and get a sweat without doing anything to impact your injury. It could speed up the whole process of goalies coming back from injuries.”
Sense Arena does not include sensors for the pads and Daccord isn’t sure it ever should, given the toll that so many up-and-downs or butterfly reps would take on goalie’s already overtaxed hips, groin and knees. Still, to Daccord, the applications are endless.
“Here’s a psychological benefit,” he said. “Say you play a game on Saturday and you lose and you don't play well and the next day is a day off before you go back out. You’re angry as a bear all day on Sunday. Now, what you can do is wake up, put SenseArena on, get a half-hour workout in, get a good sweat and put that game behind you.
“Here’s another one. You can make your own morning skate if there is none. Psychologically for a goalie, you know pre-game anxiety is a big thing that happens. So put it on in the basement or living room and get yourself feeling relaxed and zeroed in before the game.”
Tetiva doesn't come from a hockey background. He played pro basketball in his native Czech Republic for a couple of years before transitioning into a career of innovation and product development with links to tech. But when his son, Vaclav, started to play hockey, he saw an opportunity.
“Almost four years ago, the tech of virtual reality really matured; the quality of the screens, the quality of the tracking and other things created an opportunity to leverage it and find uses that would make sense,” he said. “My biggest fear at that time was I thought, ‘There must be 10 other companies doing the same thing right now,’ but it turned out that there was only one other venture we knew of that tried to achieve the same thing as we did and they didn’t achieve it.”
Tetiva first approached Daccord about the idea about a year ago and Daccord admits he was lukewarm after the presentation on a computer. Then Tetiva invited him out to a training center where the system was in use.
“The difference between looking at the drills on a computer and putting the Oculus Quest 2 helmet on and being in a 360-degree experience in that arena is apples to oranges,” Daccord said. “After we did the first drill, I turned around and put the controller on the top of the net but there was no net and I dropped the controller from the top of the net to the floor. That’s how real it felt.
“The tech is so freaking good and the experience is so freaking good that I had to get involved and help Bob start designing drills.”
Raanta is still learning which drills suit him best and how best to utilize the system, but after Daccord and Tetiva made some tweaks to make the drills more game-like, Daccord said the goalies who have used it for a while have seen some key benefits, like working on screens.
“Think about the model that says you need 10,000 hours of practice to master something,” Daccord said. “With this, you’re building your 10,000 hours of practice but again, you’re not taking a toll on the body while you’re doing it.”
Tetiva said Daccord has been one of several instrumental voices in helping perfect the system, specifically its drills, since its inception.
“Three years ago, I went to USA Hockey and they were so willing to give it a try, all these really smart guys, but when I look back I laugh because it was frankly so shitty,” Tetiva said. “Seeing how much we have developed the software as well as the hardware, it has been an absolutely fantastic journey that has taught me a lot. We have had troubles and technical issues and we invested money in things that didn't make sense and we made many mistakes. Finally, we have this very successful version for goalies that even the Coyotes use.”
While Tetiva is happy with the current version, he said it will continue to evolve to meet the needs of goalies.
“I can disclose one thing we are working on especially for the pros; the top tier of hockey,” he said. “Goalies have asked us if it’s possible to re-create the systems of actual teams for them, take the video from the games, plug it in, and have the system convert it into what they see in front of them.
“We want to add a tool for power play situations and concrete systems of real teams so that goalies can rehearse before the game what the play and the situation is going to be in front of them the following day, or that evening. It’s more to get reps against an opposing team’s power play or systems so you would not be surprised by what might happen in a real game.”
Raanta has not taken his system on the ice yet, but he plans to at some point. He said he is only scratching the surface of potential uses for the system.
“With how the world is right now with COVID, there have been some long breaks where you are not on the ice so maybe this can be helpful for that,” he said. “We’ll see about taking it to the rink and trying it before you go on the ice. It might make a difference with how you track the puck right away because you’ve already had those reps, so there’s still a lot of things to work on with it.
“I think every week they are still working on it. It’s not a finished product, it’s still a work in progress, so it will only get better. For an old goalie like I am, it's nice to try something new and something that doesn’t have the same wear and tear on my body. It’s 2021 so you knew this day was coming when modern technology would take a step forward and you would start using it for practice to get reps. It’s interesting, for sure, it has been fun to try it, and there’s a lot more I still can do with it.”
Follow Craig Morgan on Twitter: @CraigSMorgan
Craig, you wrote an article about the Coyotes "leading the pack" (sorry or the pun) in the NHL in the goalie department. Teams and especially writers that ignore this are simply showing their bias, which AZ has had to battle with continuously. This article, however, is a confirmation of that fact you wrote about. They bought that system, not cheap ($1700) for all 3 of their goalies. This is also a backhanded compliment that they included Adin Hill, am insight into what they think of him. They are definitely committed to doing all they can to strengthen this part of their team. Uhm, maybe the rest of the league should take notice.
More than skaters, goalies are at the mercy of having good shooters available to get in their reps and stay sharp. This sounds like a cheap and accessible alternative for off days (or weeks).