Hockey or field hockey was once played exclusively on grass and was a relatively slow, tactical game in which players tended to confine their activities to certain areas of the pitch. The introduction of artificial turf has transformed the game, making it much faster with play moving quickly from one end of the pitch to the other. Players require high levels of fitness to keep up with the game and to ensure that their ball-hitting skills do not break down when they become tired. So, in addition to improving individual skill work (dribbling, shooting, and passing), hockey players need to develop agility, coordination, flexibility, running speed, and stamina. See also ice hockey.

Dental Dictionary: hockey

A team contact sport played on ice skates or with roller blades. Because limited facial protection for the players exists (except for the goalie), there is opportunity for traumatic injury to the face and teeth.

British History: hockey

Hockey claims a very ancient pedigree since there are tomb-drawings and classical reliefs showing men hitting a ball with curved sticks. Like most games, it was formalized and regulated in the 19th cent. Blackheath had a hockey club before 1861 and Teddington introduced the hard ball into the game in the 1870s. The National Association was formed in 1886, mainly by London clubs. The Federation of International Hockey was established in 1924.

US History Encyclopedia: Hockey

Hockey in the United States originated during the summer of 1894. American and Canadian college students participating in a tennis tournament in Niagara Falls, Canada, learned that during the winter months they played different versions of the same game. The Canadians played hockey, the Americans a game they called "ice polo." Boasting of their prowess, the students challenged each other to a competition. In a series of matches staged that next winter in Montreal, Ottawa, Toronto, and Kingston, the Canadians won all the hockey games and managed to tie two of the ice polo contests. Within a few years American colleges and amateur clubs along the Eastern Seaboard had forsaken ice polo for hockey.

At approximately the same time, Minnesotans learned about hockey from their neighbors in Manitoba; players from the upper peninsula of Michigan also challenged Canadians in hockey games. The debut of the Western Pennsylvania and Interscholastic Hockey leagues brought hockey also to Pittsburgh and its environs. By the turn of the twentieth century, hockey had become popular in three separate regions of the United States.

Early Leagues

In 1904, a northern Michigan dentist named J. L. Gibson found enough eager investors from mining companies to form the first professional hockey league. Although the International Professional Hockey League (IPHL) enjoyed some success, it survived only three seasons, disappearing in 1907.

Two years later, in 1909, mining entrepreneur Michael John O'Brien and his son Ambrose joined forces with P. J. Doran, owner of the Montreal Wanderers whose team had been excluded from the Canadian Hockey Association (CHA), to organize the National Hockey Association (NHA), the immediate predecessor of the National Hockey League (NHL). When the NHA began play on 5 January 1910, it had five teams based in three small Ontario towns, Colbalt, Haileybury, and Renfrew, and two teams in Montreal, the Wanderers and an all French-Canadian squad known as Les Canadiens.

So popular did the NHA become that it competed effectively against the CHA. When representatives of the rival leagues met to discuss a merger, NHA officials agreed to take only two clubs from the CHA, the Ottawa Senators and the Montreal Shamrocks, causing the collapse of the CHA. The now seven-team NHA became the top professional hockey league in North America.

Because they could not afford to neglect the family business in British Columbia to play hockey in eastern Canada, Frank and Lester Patrick left the NHA and founded the Pacific Coast Hockey Association (PCHA) in 1911. The PCHA carried out innovations in the rules and style of play that have been incorporated into the modern game, such as tabulating assists (the NHA did the same in 1913), permitting goaltenders to sprawl to make saves (the NHA required them to remain standing), and adding blue lines to divide the ice into zones (the NHA left the ice surface unmarked). PCHA rules also permitted the players to pass the puck forward while in the neutral zone, whereas the NHA permitted only backward passing and required skaters to carry the puck (that is, to push the puck along the ice with their sticks) toward the opponent's goal. In 1913 the NHA and the PCHA agreed to play an annual five-game series to determine the championship of professional hockey and claim the coveted Stanley Cup, named for Lord Frederick Arthur Stanley, the governor-general of Canada.

The Advent of the National Hockey League

During the World War I the NHA teams lost players to military service, attendance declined, and owners reduced salaries. With so many players in the armed forces, the NHA board of directors voted to dismantle their partnership and, in November 1917, reorganized as the National Hockey League. The National Hockey League inaugurated play on 19 December 1917as a four-team circuit, with the Canadiens and Wanderers based in Montreal, the Senators in Ottawa, and the Arenas in Toronto. (Quebec had received the rights to a franchise, but the owners did not put a team on the ice in 1917). After a fire on 2 January 1918 reduced the Westmount Arena to ashes and left the Wanderers homeless, the team withdrew from the league, having played only four games.

Survival of the fittest was the law for both franchises and players during the early years of the National Hockey League. The teams struggled to fill their arenas and to make profits. The players endured a vicious brand of hockey in which fists and sticks took their toll. They also accepted extraordinarily low salaries, even by the standards of the day. Harry Cameron, the highest paid player on the Stanley Cup champion Toronto Arenas in 1918, earned a paltry $900 per year. The Montreal Canadiens and the Ottawa Senators dominated the NHL from 1917 until 1926. Between them, they represented the league in six of the first nine Stanley Cup series played against teams from the Pacific Coast Hockey Association or the Western Canada Hockey League.

Growth and Contraction

In 1924 the NHL expanded into the United States when the Boston Bruins entered the league. Before the 1925–1926 season, the New York Americans and the Pittsburgh Pirates came in, and Canadians feared that the Americans were about to steal their national game.

Between 1926 and 1942 the NHL grew from a tiny circuit of Canadian teams into the major North American professional hockey league. The growth of the NHL was not lost on the owners of teams in the Pacific Coast Hockey Association and the Western Canada Hockey League. In 1926 the Patrick brothers concluded they could no longer compete with the NHL and so dissolved their league, selling many of the players' contracts to NHL teams.

With the onset of the Great Depression in 1929, teams from smaller markets, such as the Ottawa Senators and the Pittsburgh Pirates, struggled to compete and eventually suspended operations. In 1941, after moving to Brooklyn, the New York Americans also withdrew from the NHL. The six surviving NHL teams were the Boston Bruins, the Chicago Black Hawks, the Detroit Red Wings, the Montreal Canadiens, the New York Rangers, and the Toronto Maple Leafs. Many regard the twenty-five year period between 1942 and 1967 as the "Golden Age of Hockey." Yet competition among the "Original Six" was uneven. The Bruins, Black Hawks, and Rangers struggled; the Maple Leafs, Red Wings, and Canadiens dominated.

The stability that had characterized the National Hockey League between 1942 and 1967 gave way to the tumult of the years 1968 through 1979. The prospect of substantial profits and the threat of a new professional hockey league combined to induce NHL owners to add six new teams: the Los Angeles Kings, the Minnesota North Stars, the Philadelphia Flyers, the Pittsburgh Penguins, the Oakland Seals, and the St. Louis Blues. In 1970 the NHL expanded to fourteen teams, adding the Buffalo Sabers and the Vancouver Canucks, and split into two divisions, with the Original Six clubs playing in the East and the expansion teams in the West. Predictably, the Original Six teams dominated the NHL immediately after expansion. The Montreal Canadiens won Stanley Cups in 1971 and 1973, and then enjoyed a sting of four consecutive championships between 1975–1976 and 1978–1979.

The World Hockey Association, 1972–1979

The invention of Gary Davidson and Dennis Murphy, who had also organized the American Basketball Association, the World Hockey Association (WHA) began play in 1972 and for seven years competed with the NHL. With franchises in Chicago, Cleveland, Edmonton, Houston, Los Angeles, Minnesota, New England (later Hartford, Connecticut), New York, Ottawa, Philadelphia, Quebec, and Winnipeg, the league gained immediate credibility when such established NHL stars as Gordie Howe, Bobby Hull, Frank Mahovlich, and Jacques Plante signed with association teams. Along with the NHL players who vaulted to the new league, the WHA advertised a host of young talent, including Mike Gartner, Mark Howe, Mark Messier, and Wayne Gretzky, each of whom later made his mark in the NHL.

The WHA operated on a slender budget before going out of existence in 1979, with four franchises, the Edmonton Oilers, Quebec Nordiques, Hartford Whalers, and Winnipeg Jets, joining the NHL. During its existence, however, the league offered an exciting brand of hockey, only slightly inferior to the quality of play in the NHL, and the inter-league competition for players succeeded in raising the average salaries in both leagues. The principal response of the NHL to the WHA was additional expansion, planting franchises in Atlanta (later Calgary) and Long Island in 1972, and in Kansas City (later Colorado and New Jersey) and Washington in 1974. Such preemptive strikes forestalled the establishment of WHA teams in those markets.

The Europeans Arrive

The American Olympic hockey squad excited new interest in the sport with the celebrated "Miracle on Ice" in 1980, while the New York Islanders and the Edmonton Oilers ruled the NHL throughout the decade. More important, the demographic composition of the NHL began to change. The percentage of Canadian players declined from 82.1 percent in 1980 to 75.5 percent by 1989, while the number of U.S. and European players rose.

The Russians arrived in force during the late 1980s and early 1990s, especially after the disintegration of the Eastern Bloc in 1989 and the collapse of Soviet Union in 1991. By 1998, 22.5 percent of NHL players came from outside Canada and the United States. Swedes, Finns, Czechs, Slovaks, Latvians, Russians, and a smattering of Germans composed the international roster of the NHL. The influx of Americans, Europeans, and Russians resonated with fans. NHL attendance grew throughout the decade. In 1979 average attendance was 12,747 per game. Ten years later, it had climbed to 14,908.

Problems and Prospects

Fundamental changes also took place off the ice during the 1980s and 1990s, especially in the reorganization of the National Hockey League Players Association (NHLPA). By the end of the 1980s, many players feared that Alan Eagleson, the executive director of the NHLPA since its inception in 1967, had grown too close to management to represent the players effectively. Eagleson survived two attempts to oust him in 1989. Only after his resignation in 1991, however, did players learn that he had embezzled from the pension fund and committed fraud in the process of arranging international hockey tournaments. Convicted of these charges in January 1998, Eagleson was fined and imprisoned, becoming the first Honored Member to have his plaque removed from the Hockey Hall of Fame.

On 1 January 1992, lawyer and agent Bob Goode-now assumed control of the NHLPA. In April 1992, after only four months in office, Goodenow called the first players' strike in league history. The strike cost NHL president John Ziegler his job, and the NHL Board of Governors elected Gary Bettman, the former senior vice president of the National Basketball Association, as the first commissioner.

Even before Bettman assumed control of the NHL, team owners determined to increase its exposure. That aspiration was, in part, the rationale for expanding the league again during the 1990s. Two new franchises, the Tampa Bay Lightning and a second version of the Ottawa Senators, began play in 1992, and the Board of Governors also awarded franchises to Anaheim and Florida.

Despite its growing popularity, the NHL suffered through a series of crises during the 1990s, including franchise relocations, the financial and legal problems of various NHL owners, and a damaging lockout in 1994–1995 that shortened the regular season to 48 games. The lockout temporarily halted the momentum that Bettman had kindled, but during the late 1990s the league still managed to expand into new markets and attract new fans. The Nashville Predators began play in 1998; Atlanta also received an expansion franchise, the Thrashers, in 1999. For the 2000–2001 season, Minneapolis-St. Paul, which had lost its team when the North Stars moved to Dallas in 1993, got the Minnesota Wild, while the Blue Jackets began play in Columbus, Ohio. Although continuing to prosper, at the beginning of the twenty-first century, the NHL was threatened by the financial instability of small-market Canadian teams, dramatically escalating player salaries, and the prospect of another protracted labor dispute.

Bibliography

Bernstein, Ross. Frozen Memories: Celebrating a Century of Minnesota Hockey. Minneapolis: Nordin Press, 1999.

Diamond, Dan, et al. The NHL Official Guide and Record Book. New York: Total Sports Publishing, 2000.

Diamond, Dan, et al., eds. Total Hockey: The Official Encyclopedia of the National Hockey League, 2d ed. Kansas City, Mo.: Andrew McMeel, 2000.

Falla, Jack, et al. Quest for the Cup: A History of the Stanley Cup Finals, 1893–2001. Berkeley, Calif: Thunder Bay, 2001.

McFarlane, Brian. The History of Hockey. Champaign, Ill.: Sports Publishing, 1997.

McKinley, Michael. Etched in Ice: A Tribute to Hockey's Defining Moments. Vancouver, B.C.: Greystone, 2002.

———. Putting a Roof on Winter: Hockey's Rise from Sport to Spectacle. Toronto: Douglas and McIntyre, 2000.

Word Tutor: hockey

IN BRIEF: A game in which the players use curved sticks to try to drive a rubber disk or ball into the other team's goal.

I went to the fights, and a hockey game broke out. — Steven Wright

Quotes About: Hockey

Quotes:

"How would you like a job where when you made a mistake, a big red light goes on and 18,000 people boo?" - Jacques Plante

Wikipedia: hockey

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Hockey is any of a family of sports in which two teams compete by trying to maneuver a ball, or a hard, round disc called a puck, into the opponent's net or goal, using a hockey stick. The dominant version of hockey in a particular region tends to be known simply as hockey, other forms being more fully qualified.

Field hockey

Main article: Field hockey

Field hockey game at Melbourne University.

Field hockey is played on gravel, natural grass, sand-based or water-based artificial turfs, with a small, hard ball. The game is popular among both males and females in many continents of the world, particularly in Europe, Asia, Australasia, and South Africa. In most countries, the game is played between single-sex sides, although it can be played by mixed-sex sides. In the United States and Canada it is played predominantly by women.

The 116-member governing body is the International Hockey Federation (FIH). Field Hockey has been played at each summer Olympic Games since 1908 (except 1924). Modern field hockey sticks are J-shaped and constructed of a composite of wood, glass fibre or carbon fibre (sometimes both) and have a curved hook at the playing end, a flat surface on the playing side and curved surface on the rear side.

There are 4000-year-old drawings in Egypt of a game resembling field hockey being played. While modern field hockey appeared in the mid-18th century in England, primarily in schools, it was not until the first half of the 19th century that it became firmly established. The first club was created in 1849 at Blackheath in south-east London.

Ice hockey

Main article: Ice hockey

The Barrie Colts applying pressure at the Brampton Battalion net in an ice hockey game.

Ice hockey is played on a large flat area of ice, using a three inch (76.2 mm) diameter vulcanized rubber disc called a puck. This puck is often frozen before high-level games to decrease the amount of bouncing and friction on the ice. The game is contested between two teams of skaters. The game is played all over North America, Europe and in many other countries around the world to varying extent.

The 64-member governing body is the International Ice Hockey Federation, (IIHF). Men's ice hockey has been played at the Winter Olympics since 1924, and was in the 1920 Summer Olympics. Women's ice hockey was added to the Winter Olympics in 1998. North America's National Hockey League (NHL) is the strongest professional ice hockey league, drawing top ice hockey players from around the globe. The NHL rules are slightly different from those used in Olympic ice hockey - the periods are 20 minutes long, counting downwards. There are three periods.

Ice hockey sticks are long L-shaped sticks made of wood, graphite, or composites with a blade at the bottom that can lie flat on the playing surface when the stick is held upright and can curve either way as to help a left- or right-handed player gain an advantage. Variations in curves include its lie and its curve type. Most companies that produce sticks have sponsored players and in return, use their custom curve on publicly retailed sticks. To shoot with a left curved stick, the stick is held with the right hand at the top and the left hand partway down the shaft. To shoot with a right curved stick, the stick is held with the left hand at the top and the right hand partway down the shaft. Most people who are right handed shoot with a left curved stick, and most people who are left handed shoot with a right curved stick. This keeps their dominant hand at the top of the stick, allowing more control. Sticks also have flex numbers, a number on the stick that can go from zero to 100. It indicates how much the stick will bend before breaking when pressed on the ice. This flexing is what enables slapshots.

There are early representations and reports of hockey-type games being played on ice in the Netherlands, and reports from Canada from the beginning of the nineteenth century, but the modern game was initially organized by students at McGill University, Montreal in 1875 who, by two years later, codified the first set of ice hockey rules and organized the first teams.

Some notable players in ice hockey are Wayne Gretzky, Gordie Howe, Maurice "The Rocket" Richard, and Dino Lelis.

Road hockey

Main article: Road hockey

Another form of popular hockey is road hockey, sometimes known as street hockey.

Roller hockey (inline)

Inline Hockey (Roller) is played worldwide on inline skates

Main article: Inline hockey

Inline hockey is a variation of roller hockey very similar to ice hockey, from which it is derived. Inline hockey is played by two teams, consisting of four skaters and one goalie, on a dry rink divided into two halves by a center line, with one net at each end of the rink. The game is played in four 15-minute periods with a variation of the ice hockey off-side rule. Icings are also called, but are usually referred to as illegal clearing. For rink dimensions and an overview of the rules of the game, see IIHF Inline Rules (official rules). Some leagues and competitions do not follow the IIHF regulations, in particular USA Inline and Canada Inline.

Roller hockey (Quad)

Roller hockey (Quad) is played worldwide on quad skates.

Main article: Roller hockey (Quad)

Roller hockey (Quad) Roller Hockey is the overarching name for a roller sport that has existed long before inline skates were invented. Roller hockey has been played in sixty countries worldwide and so has many names worldwide. Sometimes the sport is called Quad Hockey, Hóquei em Patins, International Style Ball hockey, Rink hockey and Hardball hockey depending on the part of the world it is played. Roller Hockey was a demonstration rollersport in the 1992 Barcelona summer Olympics.

Unicycle hockey

Unicycle Hockey

Main article: Unicycle hockey

Unicycle hockey is similar to roller or inline hockey, however, each player must be mounted on their unicycle (with both feet on the pedals) to play at the ball. The ball is similar weight and bounce to a "dead" tennis ball and sticks are identical to roller hockey sticks. Each team consists of four players and one goalie, and substitution is allowed at any point in the game. Two common penalties are SUB (Stick Under Bike) and SIB (Stick In Bike) and result in a free shot being awarded to the player that was fouled upon. Players must also keep one hand on the end of the stick at all times and never allow the head of the stick to be lifted above waist height.

Other forms of hockey

Other games derived from hockey or its predecessors include the following:

Ball hockey is played in a gym using sticks and a ball, often a tennis ball with the fuzz removed.
Air hockey is played indoors with a puck on an air-cushion table.
Bandy is played with a ball on a football-sized ice arena, typically outdoors. It is in some ways field hockey played on ice, but bandy has in fact more in common with association football (soccer).
Beach Hockey was a professional league that played for three seasons at Huntington Beach, California. The game was played on inline skates at a rink. The league was canceled after ESPN stopped funding them due to low ratings.
Broomball is played on an ice hockey rink, but with a ball instead of a puck and a "broom" (actually a stick with a small plastic implement on the end) in place of the ice hockey stick. Instead of using skates, special shoes are used that have very soft rubbery soles to maximize grip while running around.
Bubble hockey is played in a plastic sealed table with the 'players' being moved by the use of pushing and turning rods.
Floorball, or floor hockey, is a form of hockey played in a gymnasium or in sport halls.using a plastic puck or hollow ball, and plastic sticks.
Foot hockey is played using a bald tennis ball or rolled up pair of socks and using only the feet. It is popular at elementary schools in the winter.
Gym hockey is a form of ice hockey played in a gymnasium. It uses sticks with foam ends and a foam ball or a plastic puck.
Hurling and Camogie are Irish games bearing some resemblance to - and notable differences from - hockey.
Indoor field hockey is an indoor variation of field hockey.
Mini hockey (Popularly known as "Mini-Sticks") is a form of hockey which is played in basements of houses. Players get down on their knees, using a miniature plastic stick, usually about 15 inches (38 cm) long and a small blue ball or a soft, fabric covered mini puck. They shoot into miniature goals as well. This is popular throughout North America, though it has not yet made the jump to Europe. In England this refers to a seven-a-side version of Field Hockey, played on an area equivalent to half a normal pitch for younger players, see Minkey (Mini Hockey)
Polo is a form of hockey played mounted on horseback.
PowerHockey is a form of hockey for persons requiring the use of an electric (power) wheelchair in daily life. PowerHockey is a competitive sports opportunity for the physically disabled.
Ringette is an ice hockey variant that was designed for female players; it uses a straight stick and a rubber ring in place of a puck. Note: Ringette distances itself from hockey as it has its own set of rules and is closely related to a mix of lacrosse and basketball.
Rinkball is a Scandinavian team sport, played in an ice hockey rink with a ball.
Rossall Hockey is a variation played at Rossall School on the sea shore in the winter months. Its rules are a mix of field hockey, Rugby and the Eton Wall Game.
Shinny is an informal version of ice hockey.
Shinty is a Scottish Highlands game
Skater hockey is a variant of inline hockey, played with a ball.
Sledge hockey is a form of ice hockey played by the disabled. The players sit on sleds, and push themselves up and down the ice with picks on the butt end of their shortened hockey sticks. The game is played with many of the same rules as regular ice hockey.
Spongee is a cross between ice hockey and broomball and is most popular in Manitoba, Canada. A stick and puck are used as in hockey (the puck is a softer version called a "sponge puck"), and the same soft-soled shoes used in broomball are worn. The rules are basically the same as ice hockey, but one variation has an extra player on the ice called a "rover".
Table hockey is played indoors with a table-top game.
Underwater hockey is played on the bottom of a swimming pool.
Nok Hockey A table-top version of hockey played with no defense and a small block in front of the goal.