Imagine if football or basketball teams had only a week of practice before they had to play their first games. Roughly 10 hours to integrate the freshmen, figure out the starting lineups and begin the season.

The Colorado College and Air Force hockey teams won’t have that long.

One day, two days, drop the puck.

“We’ll learn a lot about our team in those two exhibition games,’’ said CC coach Scott Owens, whose team has exhibitions Oct. 2-3 against Lethbridge and the U.S. National Under-18 team, respectively. Air Force faces Lethbridge on Oct. 4.

Both teams begin the regular season Oct. 8.

It’s nothing new, but it does speak to the relative importance of captains’ practices.Because the coaches have very limited access to players before October, a fair amount of team bonding and conditioning is done at these workouts.

“We want to put in the necessary work we have to do to make sure we’re in shape, but we can’t burn ourselves out,’’ said Air Force senior Jacques Lamoureux, alluding to the six-month season.

“Last year, I think we were the victim of that; I think we practiced a little too much.’’

It is a fine line, being ready for the season and not getting burned out at its end. And, since they’re captains’ practices, Owens and Air Force’s Frank Serratore lower the expectations.‘‘Our season is so dang long — our priorities now are academics, strength and conditioning and squadron participation,” Serratore said. “It’s important for us to get ahead of those areas.“We could do some things in October, but we might pay for it in February.’’

Owens and CC captain Ryan Lowery said they didn’t talk about the team’s first skate last week.

“We see it as a chance for them to establish themselves,’’ Owens said.

Lowery said he spent roughly 10 minutes with the other captains and seniors about the Tigers’ first skate. “For the most part, it’s what we want to do. When it’s just us out here, we won’t do any systems. Mostly, it will be just trying to get the rust off.’’

“We try to make it as close as we can to a regular practice,’’ CC alternate captain Nick Dineen said. “We’ll run the same drills we run during the season and stuff.’’

Serratore said for the Falcons it’s even less structured: “We’re not asking our captains to run full-fledged drills.’’

As Air Force senior Derrick Burnett said, captains’ practices have a social element as well.

“It doesn’t have to be on the ice,’’ he said “It’s pretty much anything to get the guys together, get away from school for a while.’’

Of course, for freshmen, these workouts are the other players’ first impression.

“We’ve all gotten to know each other off the ice, but everybody is going to see us on the ice,’’ Air Force’s Casey Kleisinger said.

After playing junior hockey, Air Force’s Jason Fabian said, it’s a chance to get a feel for what lies ahead.

“Obviously, captains’ practices aren’t going to be as fast as the games,’’ he said, “but it’s a good stepping stone between the last level and the next level.’’

Said CC freshman and first-round NHL draft pick Jaden Schwartz, “(The captains) wanted to get our pace up. Our goal is to win a national title and it starts here. They addressed that.’’

A CC captain instructs his teammates about a drill during last Friday’s first captains’ practice at Honnen Ice Arena on campus. Photo by BRYAN OLLER/THE GAZETTE