The Ninety Minutes Between Games

Watch your goalie in the second game of a doubleheader and you can usually tell what happened in the gap.

The ones who come out sharp did something with that ninety minutes. The ones who come out a half-step late mostly sat in a camp chair in the sun, ate nothing, replayed the first game, and then warmed up for four minutes because the field was running early.

It's the least supervised window of the whole day and it has a disproportionate effect on the second game.

As always: this is a coach's practical experience rather than a protocol, and the decision belongs to you and your athlete — anything involving an injury or a medical condition goes to someone qualified to examine him.

The short version

Three things, roughly in this order: get the gear off and get cool, put something small in, and let the first game go before the second one starts.

Then a real warm-up — not four minutes of half-hearted shots because the schedule moved.

The most common mistake isn't doing the wrong thing in that window. It's doing nothing, and then being rushed.

What's actually happening in that gap

He's hotter than he looks. A goalie comes off in full gear after standing in the sun, and the cooling doesn't start until the chest protector comes off. Kids often won't strip down on their own, partly because everyone else is still in kit and partly because they're fourteen.

His appetite is lying to him. Adrenaline suppresses hunger, so twenty minutes after a game he genuinely doesn't want anything, and ninety minutes later, mid-warm-up, he does. That's the mismatch this window exists to solve.

He's still in the first game. If it went badly he's been running the goals on a loop while sitting in a chair, and a goalie who carries the first game into the second one plays tight. If it went well he may have the opposite problem, which is a fourteen-year-old who's decided he's got this.

And his body has cooled down in the wrong way. Ninety minutes of sitting after intense activity leaves him stiff. The second warm-up matters more than the first one, and it's almost always the one that gets cut.

Suggestions on what you can do

Gear off first, before anything else. Chest protector, helmet, gloves, into the shade. Get him actually cool rather than nominally out of the sun.

Offer something small within about twenty minutes. After the adrenaline drops and before the appetite mismatch bites. Small and familiar — what works here is whatever he'll actually eat without being talked into it.

Keep the water going the whole gap, steadily, rather than a big drink right before he goes back on.

Give him a way to close the first game. Whatever version of a reset he uses in the program, this is the moment for it. For some kids it's two minutes alone with headphones, for others it's talking it through once and then being done. The point is that it happens deliberately rather than being left to fade.

Protect the second warm-up. Whatever his routine is, it should be the same length as the morning one. If the schedule compresses, cut something else — this is the thing most directly connected to how the first ten minutes of game two go.

Put him horizontal if there's time and a way to do it. Feet up in the shade for fifteen minutes does more than another lap of the complex.

By age: with younger goalies you're running this whole window, and you should — a nine-year-old will not manage it. From about seventh grade, hand him one piece of it at a time. By high school he should have his own between-games routine that he could describe to you if you asked, and your job is mostly not interrupting it.

A few things worth avoiding

Try not to review the first game in that window. It's the single most tempting thing to do with ninety idle minutes and it reliably makes the second game worse. The debrief, if there is one, belongs to tomorrow.

Go easy on the sun. A camp chair in direct sun for an hour and a half is its own kind of fatigue, and it's entirely avoidable.

Try not to let him fall properly asleep. A short lie-down is good; forty-five minutes out cold usually produces a groggy goalie and a rushed warm-up.

And don't schedule the meal for the gap. Something small, yes — a full meal sitting in his stomach through game two is a different problem.

What the good version looks like

Gear off inside five minutes. Shade, water, something small at twenty minutes. A quiet stretch where the first game gets closed out. Feet up. Then a full warm-up, unrushed, starting on time.

Ninety minutes isn't long, and it's just long enough for a young athlete to waste.

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Game days and rest days are both built into the program deliberately — including what a Saturday with three games replaces. Three real days of a fifth-grade week are open on the site, no signup. Take a look at the free week.

Coach Greg — LAX Goalie Hub

General information from a coach, not medical or nutritional advice. For allergies, medical conditions, injury, or any plan from a dietitian or physician, follow theirs. Suspected heat illness is a medical situation — involve on-site medical staff.