HockeyTech’s real-time analytics will track players’ speed, on-ice time, puck possession and more with sensors embedded in the puck and players’ equipment
The University of Waterloo Warriors hockey team has partnered with HockeyTech Inc. to help perfect the company’s revolutionary technology for obtaining hockey analytics. The groundbreaking system tracks data on players, on-ice officials, and the puck in real time.
The company relocated from Guelph to Waterloo recently because of the University of Waterloo’s reputation for innovation. “When we thought about how you mix hockey and technology, I can’t think of a better academic institution in the world than the University of Waterloo,” said Stu Siegel, chief executive officer of HockeyTech and former Florida Panthers managing partner and chief executive officer.
Waterloo Warrior head coach Brian Bourque said the analytics will help players improve their game. "It’s been a tremendous partnership from the start. For our student-athletes to be able to test out the technology and see the results first-hand has been a truly unique experience.
"I’m a firm believer that hockey analytics is moving towards this type of data and the more advanced stats we can receive about our players, the better they will be.”
Both the men’s and women’s Warrior teams play and practice in the Columbia Ice Fields Arena on the north campus. Twenty-four locators have been installed in the arena and each player wears a radio-frequency identifier (RFID) chip about the size of a coin. There is also a chip embedded in the puck and the locators track every move of the players/puck instantaneously.
The locators calculate in real time the precise 3D position of each chip up to 50 times per second. These coordinates run through proprietary, advanced algorithms to produce real-time statistics on each player and the puck, such as time-on-ice, skating speed, distance travelled, shot/pass speed and location, zone play, puck possession. Further development is planned for the areas of player safety, media, fan engagement, and a series of visualization tools.
“Having this revolutionary technology in our facility, along with the support and involvement of our hockey programs, coaches and athletes allows us to provide a living lab for HockeyTech to test and perfect their technology,” says Roly Webster, Waterloo’s director of athletics.
The capabilities of the analytics produced are endless and are well beyond what is currently available to hockey world. “What truly excites us even more is the idea of arming team statisticians with this data to analyze positioning during game events like goals for and goals against, said Cary Moretti, HockeyTech’s chief technology officer. “We believe that HockeyTech analytics will lead to significant changes in how the game is coached and how teams evaluate player performance.
HockeyTech, a worldwide leader in providing hockey-related technologies, analytics and information services, has been provideing cutting-edge solutions to the hockey world since 1998.
