Portal:Ice hockey
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Ice hockey, referred to simply as hockey in Canada, Sweden and the United States, is a team sport played on ice. It is one of the world's fastest sports, with players on skates capable of going high speeds on natural or artificial ice surfaces. Though played on six continents, ice hockey, as a participatory and as a spectator sport, is most popular in nations in which the climate is sufficiently cold as to permit natural, long-term seasonal ice cover; Canada, the Czech Republic, Finland, Slovakia, Sweden, Russia, and the United States have dominated international competition, claiming 47 of the 48 gold and silver medals awarded in the men's and women's competitions at the Olympic Winter Games.
Ice hockey is one of the four major North American professional sports, represented at the highest level by the National Hockey League. It is the official national winter sport of Canada, where six of the 30 NHL franchises are based; Canadian-born players, though, outnumber American-born players in the NHL by a factor of three (30 per cent, additionally, come from outside North America). The sport is played on a hockey rink. During normal play, there are six players, comprising five positional players and one goaltender, per team on the ice at any time, each of whom is on ice skates. There are five players and one goaltender per side. The objective of the game is to score goals by shooting a hard vulcanized rubber disc, the puck, into the opponent's goal net, with the goal nets placed at opposite ends of the rink. The players may control the puck using a long stick with a blade that is commonly curved at one end. Players may also generally redirect the puck with any part of their bodies, but the kicking of the puck into the goal is prohibited.
The five positional players are typically divided into three forwards and two defensemen. The forward positions are named left wing, centre and right wing. Forwards often play together as units or lines, with the same three forwards' always playing together. The defensemen usually stay together as a pair, but may change less frequently than the forwards. A substitution of an entire unit at once is called a line change. When players are substituted during play, it is called changing on the fly.
The boards surrounding the ice help keep the puck in play, and play often proceeds for minutes without interruption. When play is stopped, it is restarted with a faceoff. The movement of the puck is limited by two major proscriptions, one against offsides play and the other against icing; officials may also whistle any of several penalties, the result of the most common of which is the removal of a player from the game for two minutes, such that his team plays with only four positional players, giving the opposing team a power play.
Other characteristics of the game change depending on the particular code of play employed. The two most prominent codes are those of the NHL and the International Ice Hockey Federation; North American amateur leagues typically use a hybrid of the NHL and IIHF codes, while European professional leagues often follow IIHF rules.
The neutral zone trap is an ice hockey defensive strategy by which a team seeks to prevent an opposing offense from proceeding unhindered through the neutral zone—the area on a hockey rink, pictured, bounded by blue lines—most often by forcing turnovers in that area; inasmuch as the trap seeks to obstruct play and minimize goal scoring, the strategy is often essayed by teams offensively inferior, but is occasionally employed by teams with leads seeking to consume time.
In its most common formulation, the trap features four players—two defensemen and two forwards—stationed in the neutral zone and one forward—often a center qua power forward—serving as a forechecker in the offensive zone, the end zone between a blue line and the wall of the rink anterior and peripheral to the goal toward which a team proceeds. The forechecking forward maintains a central position, such that opposing puckhandlers should be forced to pass to teammates on the periphery of the ice or themselves to handle the puck toward either sideboard.
Upon the puck's being diverted toward one wing, the two defensive forwards—positioned proximate to the red line, that which divides the width of the rink in two, contest the movement of the puck or the puckhandler, seeking to congest play and generally to frustrate offensive efforts; defensemen situated near the blue line serve, before the goaltender, to contest any passer or puckhandler who should seek to enter the defensive zone.
The trap was most prominently used by the New Jersey Devils during the 1994-95 season of the National Hockey League, in the culminating Stanley Cup Finals of the playoffs of which the Devils defeated the Detroit Red Wings in four straight games. The trap was criticized as creating a game less interesting for fans, given its deleterious effect on scoring, and discussion of means by which to minimize the slowing effects of the trap was undertaken by the League and the NHL Players Association in the context of the 2004-05 lockout; officials were ultimately ordered to enforce strictly proscriptions against obstruction, in order that offensive players should be permitted to move more freely.
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On October 6, 2001, an ice hockey rink was constructed within Spartan Stadium in East Lansing, Michigan, United States, the home football stadium of Michigan State University, to host a National Collegiate Athletic Association Division I ice hockey game between the Spartans and intrastate and intra-Central Collegiate Hockey Association rival University of Michigan Wolverines, having been moved from the Munn Ice Arena in order to accommodate the large crowds often drawn to games between the two schools; known as the Cold War, the game, a 3-3 draw, was attended by 74,544 fans, which attendance is thought to be the greatest-ever for any ice hockey game.
Televised on the American cable television network Fox Sports Net and featuring two 300-piece marching band performances during its first intermission—as in a college football game—the game was the first of several outdoor ice hockey games to be held in the United States and Canada, including the Heritage Classic, a November 22, 2003, National Hockey League regular season game played at Commonwealth Stadium, in Edmonton, Alberta, between the Edmonton Oilers and the Montréal Canadiens, won 4-3 by the Canadiens, at which an NHL record for single-game attendance–57,167–was set despite temperatures' having reached minus-30º Celsius (minus-22º Fahrenheit); the game was also the most viewed in the history of the Canadian Broadcasting Corporation network. The game was preceded by a 30-minute MegaStars game between former players from each club, including captain forward Wayne Gretzky, goaltender Grant Fuhr, and defenseman Marty McSorley from the Oilers and captain forward Guy Lafleur, forward Guy Carbonneau, and defenseman Larry Robinson; center Mark Messier, then active with the New York Rangers, received permission from his club to play.
An outdoor rink was constructed in 2006 at Lambeau Field, the home field of the Wisconsin-based Green Bay Packers of the National Football League, for a game between the University of Wisconsin-Madison Badgers and the Ohio State University Buckeyes, held concomitant to an enshrinement of individuals elected to the United States Hockey Hall of Fame; in a game styled as the Frozen Tundra Hockey Classic, the Badgers won, 4-2, during a season after which they would capture the Division I national championship.
Terrance Gordon Sawchuk (December 28, 1929—May 31, 1970) was a left-handed Canadian professional ice hockey goaltender, best known for having, at the time of his retirement won more regular season games and recorded regular season shutouts than any other National Hockey League player; for having won rookie of the year honors in the United States Hockey League and American Hockey League and thereafter the same award, styled as the Calder Memorial Trophy, at the NHL level; for having thrice been the starting goaltender on a Stanley Cup-winning team (in 1952 and 1954 with the Detroit Red Wings and in 1967 with the Toronto Maple Leafs; for having on four occasions won the Vezina Trophy, pictured, as the NHL's best goaltender; for having three times been selected as an NHL All-Star Game first-team player; for having posthumously won the Lester Patrick Trophy for service to his sport; for having been depicted on a Canadian postage stamp subsequent to his death; and for having, in view of the former, been elected to the International Hockey Hall of Fame in 1971.
Born in Winnipeg, Manitoba, Sawchuk, nicknamed Uke in view of his Ukrainian heritage, began his organized amateur ice hockey career in 1947, aged just 17 years in the junior A United States Hockey League, and played professionally one season later with the Indianapolis Capitals of the American Hockey League, considered, alongside the International Hockey League, the best minor professional North American league, and began his National Hockey League career near the end of the 1949-50 season, playing just seven games but compiling a 2.29 goals-against average.
In Sawhcuk's first full NHL season in 1950-51, Sawchuk played every minute of each of 70 regular season game, winning the Calder Trophy by posting a 1.99 goals-against average, recording 11 shutouts and winning 44 games whilst conceding 13 draws and suffering just 13 losses. Sawchuk would play in all 4200 minutes of the subsequent season, once more winning 44 games while completing 12 shutouts to earn the Vezina Trophy and first-team honors in the Fifth NHL All-Star Game; in the postseason, the Red Wings, behind Sawchuk, won four consecutive games against each of the Maple Leafs and Montréal Canadiens to win the 1951-52 Stanley Cup finals.
Sawchuk once more led the league in goaltender wins in 1952-53, winning the Vezina Trophy and helping the Red Wings to the Prince of Wales Trophy before sustaining an injury in practice with seven games remaining in the regular season; the Red Wings replaced Sawchuk with Glenn Hall, but the team fell in the Stanley Cup semifinals to the Boston Bruins. Sawchuk would play 68 games in both the 1953-54 and 1954-55 seasons, totalling 24 shutouts and 75 wins and winning the 1954-55 Vezina Trophy. Although Harry Lumley of the Toronto Maple Leafs won the 1953-54 Vezina, Sawchuk led the Red Wings past the Maple Leafs in the five games in the best-of-seven-game semifinals before completing all seven games of the Stanley Cup finals, helping the Red Wings to the franchise's fifth Stanley Cup.
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- Hockey belongs to the Cartoon Network, where a person can be pancaked by an Acme anvil, then expanded–accordion-style–back to full stature, without any lasting side effect. — American sportswriter Steve Rushin, in Sports Illustrated, on the physical indomitability of hockey players
- There will never be a salary cap. I've told the players to be prepared for a long lockout by the owners. It may last a year, it may last two or three years, but we will never accept a salary cap. This isn't the NFL. I'm confident the players are prepared for whatever happens. — National Hockey League Players Association executive director Bob Goodenow, on the unwillingness of his union to accept, from the National Hockey League, a collective bargaining agreement of which a salary cap was a component, prior to the formal cancellation of the 2004-05 season
- This is great news for the game of ice hockey as a unifying agent. — International Ice Hockey Federation president René Fasel, on the 2006 contesting of a friendly match in Chuncheon between the Democratic People's Republic of Korea and the People's Republic of Korea
- The best players played to their ability and Mario was amazing the way he led the team. Every time you win, it's special, and this time was even more special because we won in Toronto. — Canada men's national team advisor Wayne Gretzky, on the side's winning the 2004 World Cup of Hockey on home ice and under the direction of captain Mario Lemieux, pictured, with the Pittsburgh Penguins
- I can't believe it. This is awesome. I felt good all game, not nervous at all. We've watched the movie Miracle many times, and I always imagine that I am Jim Craig. — Sweden women's national team goaltender Kim Martin, on her team's semifinal shootout victory over the United States team in the XVII Olympic Winter Games in 2006, the first victory over the United States by any side other than that of Canada in international play, in a game compared to that in the XIII Olympic Winter Games, styled as the Miracle on Ice, in which the United States defeated the Soviet Union
- Yes, I played in six of those games and scored two goals and had two assists, but nobody knows about that. — Canada men's national team left wing Jean-Paul Parise, on his having attacked referee Josef Kampolla–whom Parise nearly struck with his stick–who had called penalties for interference and game misconduct on Parise, in the eighth and final game of the 1972 Summit Series, in which his team ultimately defeated the Soviet Union, 6-5
- Hockey would not have the same appeal if it were played on ground or grass. Ice is what gives the coolest game on Earth...its distinguishing characteristics. — Université de Moncton adjunct physics professor Alain Haché
- In the first first period of a game between his team and the Washington Capitals, Colorado Avalanche centre Joe Sakic assists on a goal scored by teammate left wing Andrew Brunette to become the eleventh player in National Hockey League history to have totaled at least 1500 points in his career; in view of his having spent each of his eighteen NHL seasons with the Avalanche franchise (styled previously as the Quebec Nordiques), Sakic also becomes just the sixth player to have tallied all of at least 1500 points with one organization.
- At the Mellon Arena in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, United States, behind a third-period goal scored by forward Jamie Langenbrunner, the New Jersey Devils defeat the Pittsburgh Penguins, 2-1, to earn goaltender Martin Brodeur, who permits just one goal on across 38 shots, his 450th National Hockey League win; Brodeur, having one week thither displaced Terry Sawchuk for third place in the enumeration of goaltenders by career regular season wins, becomes, after Patrick Roy and Ed Belfour, just the third player in NHL history to have totalled at least 450 career wins.
- The 2006-2007 ECHL regular season, to be contested, as that of 2005-2006, amongst 25 teams, although with the Greenville Grrrowl, the 2002 Patrick Kelly Cup titlists, and the San Diego Gulls excluded in view of the franchises' having been dissolved in view of pecuniary concerns, and with the Texas Wildcatters, last of the league in 2004-2005 but absent from the 2005-2006 season in view of the unavailability of the Hurricane Rita-damaged Ford Arena, the home rink, situated in Beaumont, Texas, of the side, and the Cincinnati Cyclones, last of the league in the 2003-2004 season but absent thereafter in view of the temporary unavailability of the U.S. Bank Arena, included.
- The 89th season of the National Hockey League, the first since the 2003-2004 season in which an All-Star Game is to be contested and the first for which, consistent with the league's collective bargaining agreement, constituent teams may spend to a salary cap of $44 million, begins after an offseason in which 133 players leave the teams for which they last played in the 2005-2006 season via free agency and in which 58 players are exchanged between teams by trades.
- Right wing Tie Domi, having entered the National Hockey League in 1988 upon his being drafted from the Peterborough Petes of the Ontario Hockey League by the Toronto Maple Leafs and having thereafter played for the New York Rangers and Winnipeg Jets prior to his 1995 return to Toronto, announces his retirement; Domi, known often as an enforcer, leaves professional play having, over 1020 games, been assessed 3515 penalty minutes, more than any player save Dave Williams and Dale Hunter.
- Play of the 2006-2007 seasons of the three major junior ice hockey leagues—the Western, Quebec Major Junior, and Ontario Hockey Leagues—comprised by the Canadian Hockey League begins.
- The 2006-2007 season of the Elitserien, the premier Swedish ice hockey league, begins. The Malmö Redhawks, the 1992 and 1994 league champion, and the Skellefteå AIK, the 1978 Swedish champion but not an Elitserien constituent side since 1990 are promoted to the league from the HockeyAllsvenskan in view of their placings in the round-robin Kvalserien, whilst 2005-2006 participants Leksands IF and Södertälje SK, the former a 2004 Elitserien promotee and the latter a seven-time Swedish champion, are relegated to Allsvenskan play.
- American goaltender Rick DiPietro agrees to a fifteen-year, $65.7 million contract with the New York Islanders; it is, after that of twenty-one years between Canadian center Wayne Gretzky and the Edmonton Oilers agreed to in 1979, the longest-ever in the National Hockey League.
- The 2006-2007 season of the Russian Pro Hockey League, which comprises the Russian Hockey Super League and the Vysshaya Liga begins; the Molot-Prikamye Perm, having been relegated to the latter after the 2005-2006 season, and HC Spartak Moscow, five times a Soviet champion, which franchise is disbanded, do not play in the Super League, whilst the Amur Khabarovsk and Traktor Chelyabinsk, Vysshaya Liga promotees, join the League.
- Russian center Evgeni Malkin, a prospect of the Pittsburgh Penguins, having been selected by the National Hockey League (NHL) squad with the second overall pick in the 2004 NHL draft, having expressed a desire to leave Metallurg Magnitogorsk, agrees to a one-year contract with the Russian Hockey Super League side but subsequently avers that he was pressured to sign; Malkin unannouncedly leaves the Finnish training camp of Metallurg and appears in Los Angeles, California, United States, whereupon Metallurg announces its intention to pursue legal action against Malkin and the Penguins.
- Canadian center Steve Yzerman, a 20-year captain of the Detroit Red Wings of the National Hockey League, three-time Stanley Cup champion, and 10-time NHL all-star retires from professional hockey, finishing his career with the sixth-best-ever career points scored total. Yzerman nearly retired from the sport after undergoing an osteotomy prior to the 2002-03 season but returned in mid-April 2003 and claimed the Bill Masterton Memorial Trophy.
- The 2006 National Hockey League entry draft is conducted at GM Place in Vancouver, British Columbia, Canada. The Saint Louis Blues make defenseman Erik Johnson of the United States under-18 national team the first overall selection whilst the Pittsburgh Penguins choose center Jordan Staal of the Ontario Hockey League's Peterborough Petes with the second pick; Staal, who helped the Petes to the 2006 J. Ross Robertson Cup, becomes, after brothers Eric and Marc, the third Staal to be drafted into the NHL.
- ...that Frank Finnigan, having played for the original Ottawa Senators (formerly the Ottawa Silver Seven), for whom he played more games than any other player, whom he helped to the 1926-27 Stanley Cup championship, and for whom he served as team captain during the 1930-31, 1931-32, and 1932-33 National Hockey League (NHL) seasons, and having had his sweater number retired in 1992 by the recent incarnation of the Ottawa Senators, is one of just three NHL players—alongside Jean-Claude Tremblay, who, having played for the Quebec Nordiques of the World Hockey Association (WHA), had his sweater number retired by the NHL iteration thereof, and John McKenzie, who, having long played for the Boston Bruins and thereafter for the New England Whalers in the WHA, had his number retired by the Hartford Whalers, to have been so honored by a franchise for which he never played?
- ...that the National Collegiate Athletic Association Division I Women's Ice Hockey Championship was won in each of its first five editions by a team from Minnesota—between 2001 and 2003 by the University of Minnesota Duluth Bulldogs, who over that period twice won the Western Collegiate Hockey Association (WCHA) championship and fielded three All-America selections, including 2002 and 2006 Olympic medallist Swedish forward Maria Rooth; and in 2004 and 2005 by the University of Minnesota, Twin Cities Golden Gophers, who won the WCHA championship in both years and themselves totalled four All-Americas, including forward Krissy Wendell and defenseman Lyndsay Wall, each a two-time Olympic medallist, over the two seasons?
- ...that, although HC Dynamo Moscow were the sole club from the Russian Hockey Super League (RHSL) to reach the 1998 European Hockey League final, which final the team lost to Österreichischer Eishockeyverband side VEU Feldkirch, the team won neither that year's RHSL championship–claimed by Aq Bars Kazan–nor the Cup of Russia–captured by Metallurg Magnitogorsk?
- ...that the Saint Mary's University (Halifax, Nova Scotia) Huskies reached the final of the Canadian Interuniversity Sport (CIS) ice hockey championship in four consecutive seasons between 1970 and 1973, and, having lost the University Cup each time to the Tom Watt-coached University of Toronto Varsity Blues, thrice by just one goal, never again reached the CIS tournament final?
- ...that, having advanced to the medal round of the 2002 World Junior Ice Hockey Championships, contested in the Czech Republic, after having advanced from a group comprising ultimate gold, silver, and bronze medallists Russia, Canada, and Finland, to the last of which the side lost in the bronze medal match, Switzerland faced relegation in the 2003, 2004, 2005, and 2006 iterations of the tournament?
- ...that the Detroit Red Wings' Russian Five, comprising Soviet-born center Sergei Federov, wings Vyacheslav Kozlov and Igor Larionov, and defensemen Vladimir Konstantinov and Viacheslav Fetisov, all pictured, helped the Red Wings to the 1994-95 and 1995-96 Presidents' Trophies and National Hockey League Central Division championships and the 1996-97 Stanley Cup before Konstantinov suffered a career-ending injury in an automobile accident, after which the remaining four, often joined by fellow Soviet Dmitri Mironov and wearing patches to honor Kostantinov, led the Red Wings to the 1998 Cup?
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