Will playing roller hockey hurt my ice game?? 

It's a question we hear all the time and unfortunately it often originates with ice players & coaches worried about losing players. The truth is that the majority of ROLLER players end up playing both, whereas those who start with ICE don't. Rather than give our personal opinions (we have a lot of those) we'll just throw some facts out there... 


Here's a list of a FEW current and former NHL Players who played Roller Hockey competitively (google will give you many more): 

T.J. Oshie, Ryan Kesler, Pat Maroon, Jason Zucker, Dylan Larkin, Alyes Hemsky, Jole Ward, Bobby Ryan, Brandon Carlo, Brandon Pirri, Chris Terry, Cory Conacher, Derek Stepan, Dylan Larkin, Dylan Strome, Jake Gardiner, Jake Virtanen, Jason Zucker, Kyle Connor, Paul Stastny, Phillip Di Giuseppe, Rocco Grimaldi, Sam Gagner, Troy Terry, Beau Bennett, Brad Boyes, Brett Sterling, David Booth, Gabe Gauthier, James Wisniewski, Joel Ward, Lee Sweatt, Mike Van Ryn, Peter Mannino, Tj Hensick, Taylor Aronson... and many more... 

Did playing Roller Hockey hurt those players' games? I would say not... but you can make up your own mind. At least half of our current High School Roller Team plays both roller and ICE and we deliberately make an effort when scheduling to allow for that. 

If that isn't enough evidence for you, here is a link to a related article.  Roller Hockey- The Secret is Out

Some of the obvious PROs of Roller:

  • Roller / Inline Hockey is typically MUCH less expensive
  • Access to the rinks is easier (typically there's lots of time where the public rinks are empty and players can come and practice on their own)
  • It provides an inexpensive and much less intensive entrance to the sport
  • The 4-on-4 format of the game opens up the rink and allows players more time with the puck on their stick, thus developing their puck handling skills
  • The leagues are typically less intense and more relaxed (certainly in the younger groups)