HOCKEY

1980 Olympic Attention

The new heights of popularity achieved by the National Hockey League (NHL) in the 1980s stems in part from the interest in the sport generated when the United States hockey team shocked the world by upsetting the mighty Soviets and later winning the gold medal at the 1980 Winter Olympics. The "Miracle on Ice" at Lake Placid "wound up being, quite literally, an icebreaker in terms of the sport's visibility at home and the new stature American hockey attained with the National Hockey League," wrote Robin Finn of The New York Times on the tenth anniversary of the event. "Suddenly hockey gained viability as a career for aspiring athletes who might otherwise have looked to other sports as their launching pads." Moreover, the U.S. hockey team's victory brought the sport to millions of viewers who were caught up in the excitement of the unfolding national drama but who had no previous knowledge of or interest in the game. "Winning the gold medal gave our hockey program some visibility and some credibility"' said Herb Brooks, coach of the U.S. team in 1980, "and it brought the thing into a certain degree of focus, opening doors that had only been partly opened before. It was a catalyst and a springboard," Or as hockey superstar Wayne Gretzky succinctly put it, the 1980 Olympics were "the greatest thing to happen to hockey in twenty years"

Realignment

After a period of great expansion in the 1970s, the NHL opened the 1979-1980 season with a record twenty-one teams, including four from the defunct World Hockey Association (WHA). Late in 1980 in an attempt to lend some geographical logic (in terms of regional rivalries, traveling expenses, and television scheduling) to the organization of divisions, the league's board of governors unanimously approved a realignment plan for the 1981-1982 season. "This is a major step—our business has changed," said league president John Ziegler. During the season each team would continue to play eighty games, but with the realignment teams would play each of the opponents in its division four times. Preliminary playoffs between the top four teams in each of the four divisions would now determine the semifinalists in the conference championships.

New York Islanders

The 1979-1980 season witnessed the beginning of the New York Islanders' dynasty'. During the first half of the decade the Islanders' combination of offensive firepower and defensive ruggedness proved to be insurmountable for their opponents. With perennial all-stars such as high-scoring forward Mike Bossy, nifty-passing center Bryan Trottier, hard-hitting defenseman Denis Potvin, and intimidating goalie Billy Smith at his disposal, coach Al Arbour led the Isles to four consecutive Stanley Cups from 1979-1980 to 1982-1983. As one of the Islanders' opponents put it, they were "an almost perfect team." Much like the Montreal Canadiens of the late 1970s, the Islanders of the early 1980s thoroughly dominated the league. Unlike the Canadiens, however, the Islanders were a team without a glorious past. Having entered the NHL in 1972, the Islanders' accomplishments made them the winningest team in professional sports for its age and led some to ponder where they ranked in terms of other hockey dynasties. "As far as I'm concerned," said Potvin in the immediate afterglow of the Isles' fourth championship, "we're the best hockey team ever to lace on skates." Noted for their fierce competitiveness and poise, the aging and injured Islanders reached the Stanley Cup finals yet again in 1984 but were overwhelmed four games to one by the fleet, Gretzky-led Edmonton Oilers, whom the Isles had swept in the finals the year before. The Oilers' victory inspired journalist Jack Falla to quip, "the sleek may yet inherit the ice." The Islanders' dynasty had come to its inevitable end. "I don't feel badly about turning the Cup over to them," Potvin acknowledged. "They're truly a worthy champion. This is one great, great team passing the Cup along to a team that is great."

Edmonton Oilers

Well before the 1983-1984 season Wayne Gretzky of the Edmonton Oilers was hailed by many as the best hockey player in the world, if not of all time. By his fifth NHL season Gretzky had won virtually every award a professional hockey player could win, and he had set a myriad of NHL scoring records. Gretzky put up numbers that few people could have imagined a decade before. In 1981-1982, his third year in the league, he led the NHL in goals (92), assists (120), and total points (212), all of which were single-season records. But, as was frequently noted, he had not won a Stanley Cup. Critics suggested that the Oilers' brand of wide-open, high-scoring hockey won games but did not win championships. By the 1981-1982 season, finally surrounded by talented players such as forwards Mark Messier, Jari Kurri, and Glenn Anderson, defenseman Paul Coffey, and goaltenders Grant Fuhr and Andy Moog, Gretzky captained the Oilers through a period of tremendous success. The Oilers' first league championship in 1984 signified a changing of the guard in more than one way. Gretzky proclaimed, "We proved that an offensive team can win the Cup. That can't do anything but help hockey. We showed you can win by skating and by being physical without having to fight all the time." Powered by a combination of explosive scoring and surprisingly tough defensive mettle, the Oilers emerged as the best team in hockey for the rest of the decade. "They've got the mix of the Canadiens of the late 1970s and the Islanders of the 1980s," commented Philadelphia Flyer Ed Hospodar. "They can beat you by skating or playing tough, anyway they want." With Gretzky leading the way and playing superlative, unselfish, finesse hockey, the Oilers won four Stanley Cups over a five-season stretch and established themselves as one of the greatest hockey teams in history.

The Great One

When Wayne Gretzky joined the Edmonton Oilers of the World Hockey Association (WHA) in 1978, he was seventeen years old, the youngest player ever in professional hockey. At the end of the season he was named WH A Rookie of the Year. After skating on the same line with Gretzky at the WHA All-Star Game, the legendary Gordie Howe said, "It scares me how good he could become." The next season the Oilers merged into the NHL and Gretzky became the youngest player to ever win the Hart Trophy, the league's MVP award. During his nine years in Edmonton, Gretzky won the Hart Trophy eight times. He also set the NHL's single-season scoring mark and established more than fifty other regular-season and career scoring records. In playoff action he became the all-time points leader. In two of the four years in which he led the Oilers to Stanley Cup titles, Gretzky was voted MVP of the playoffs. Recognizing Gretzky's brilliance and importance, Hall of Famer Bobby Orr in 1982 noted: "Hockey would have survived the last three years without him: hockey will always survive. But if Wayne is influencing the hundreds of thousands, the millions of kids that I think he is—well, put it this way: Thank God he's around." As Gretzky continued to rewrite the record book and win championships, his popularity and legend grew. And it became clear that his famous sobriquet "The Great One" was not hyperbolic nor merely slick marketing. It therefore came as a tremendous surprise to the sporting world when Gretzky was traded to the Los Angeles Kings in a multiplayer, multimillion-dollar deal the summer after he led the Oilers to their fourth Stanley Cup. Though the trade serves as a useful line of demarcation for his career, Gretzky continued his unparalleled success with the Kings. In his first season in Los Angeles Gretzky scored 168 points and earned his ninth Hart Trophy. Early the next season he broke Howe's all-time scoring record of 1,850 points. Howe set the record over the course of twenty-six seasons; Gretzky broke it in less than ten. In the end Mark Stevenson was correct: Gretzky's"only standard of comparison is himself."

Violence

Although professional hockey has long been noted for its rugged, physical play, game-related violence in the 1980s escalated. The 1980-1981 season, for example, witnessed a rash of brawls, including the most fight-filled game in NHL history. On 26 February 1981 the Boston Bruins and the Minnesota North Stars started fighting seven seconds into the game and continued throughout the contest. At the end of the first period some of the North Stars exchanged blows with Bruins fans. All told, seven North Stars and five Bruins were ejected from the game, and a record 84 penalties and 406 penalty minutes were assessed. After reviewing the debacle the league suspended three North Stars for their actions, and over $15,000 in fines were imposed. Unfortunately, this was not an isolated incident. A week earlier seven New York Rangers had charged into the stands of Detroit's Joe Louis Arena and fought with Red Wings fans who had been taunting them and pelting them with debris. Two days before the infamous game in Boston, the Philadelphia Flyers and the Vancouver Canucks engaged in a vicious, bench-clearing melee. The behavior of some management was not much better. Earlier in the year Boston general manager Harry Sinden was fined for pursuing a referee onto the ice during a game. With the ascendance of the Edmonton Oilers, whose style of hockey was not predicated on ferocious checking or fighting, many hoped that the sport would become less violent. It did not. In 1986, for instance, there was a substantial increase in penalties and penalty minutes for fighting. "Intimidation is still a big factor in hockey," said Calgary Flames general manager Cliff Fletcher. "In fact it's probably the major factor. Every team likes to have one or two enforcers or designated hit men so that the rest of the team feels comfortable." This explains why a small number of players, such as Dave "Tiger" Williams and Chris Nilan, had a disproportionate share of major fighting penalties. Over the course of the decade NHL officials combated the outbursts of violence with increasingly stiff fines and suspensions, and some stars like Gretzky spoke out against fighting, but in general the league chose to accept what it described as "spontaneous combat which comes with the frustrations of the game."

Lemieux

After being drafted number one overall in 1984, Montrealer Mario Lemieux of the Pittsburgh Penguins won the NHL's Calder Trophy as the league's Rookie of the Year for the 1984-1985 season. By scoring 100 points, the third-highest total ever for a rookie, Lemieux almost immediately established himself as the second-best player in professional hockey. As Sports Illustrated later observed, "Where Wayne Gretzky once stood alone, Mario Lemieux presumes to tread." As both a goal scorer and passer, Lemieux was a dominating offensive force. Bigger and stronger than Gretzky, Lemieux was no less gifted and graceful than the Great One. "His imagination and creativity are endless," said coach Mike Keenan. "His reach is great, his talent is excessive." Following two superlative seasons, Lemieux blossomed into a full-fledged superstar in 1987. Playing with Gretzky in the Canada Cup tournament, Lemieux emerged as the Canadian team's star. Parlaying his success into added confidence, Lemieux broke Gretzky's streak of seven consecutive league scoring titles, with 168 points during the 1987-1988 season. The next season Lemieux again won the league scoring crown by amassing 199 points, setting an NHL regular-season record with 13 shorthanded goals. He also became the Penguins' all-time leader in assists and the first player other than Gretzky to score 50 goals in fewer than the first 50 games of the season. Rewarded for his achievements in 1989, Lemieux signed a five-year, $12 million contract with the Penguins, joining Gretzky as the only other NHL player to make more than $2 million a year. "Had he arrived in the NHL in an era other than Gretzky's," wrote Austin Murphy, "he would have had the whole pantheon to himself." Following another great season in 1989-1990, Lemieux fell victim to a spate of serious injuries, most notably to his back, which forced him to miss more than half of the 1990-1991 season. Still, he came back to lead the Penguins to their first-ever Stanley Cup and won the Conn Smythe Trophy as the MVP of the playoffs. On 13 January 1993 it was announced that Lemieux was diagnosed with Hodgkin's disease, a form of cancer. Following a month of radiation treatment, he returned to the ice in time to lead the league in scoring with 160 points.

Soviet Invasion

Even before the fall of the Berlin Wall in November 1989, there were signs that the Cold War in hockey was nearly over. Nine former Soviet players were already signed to play in the upcoming 1989-1990 NHL season. The Soviet players—with the exception of Alexander Mogilny of the Buffalo Sabres, who defected in May—were allowed to join the NHL with the stipulation that a portion of their salaries was to be paid to the Soviet Ice Hockey Federation. Unlike the proliferation of Europeans in the league (mostly Swedes, Finns, Czechs, and Slovaks), the "arrival of the powerful Soviet contingent in the NHL came about as a result of the policies of perestroika (restructuring) introduced by Soviet leader Mikhail Gorbachev," noted John Howse. The entry of Soviets into the league generated a great deal of fanfare and diplomatic goodwill, and many fans expected significant contributions from players such as Vladimir Krutov and Igor Larionov, members of the Soviet National Team's famed "KLM" line. Not everyone, however, was pleased by the arrival of the Soviets. "There is an undercurrent of resentment by [some] North American players," observed Jay Greenberg, "both because of jobs lost to the Soviet athletes and a lingering cold war antipathy." By the end of the season many were disappointed by the peformance of the Soviet veterans. Aside from Sergei Makarov of the Calgary Flames, who won the Calder Trophy as the league's Rookie of the Year, Jim Matheson of The Sporting News concluded that the "Soviet invasion was a washout."

Sources:

Jay Greenberg, NHL: The World of Professional Hockey (New York: Rutledge Press, 1981);

Wayne Gretzky, Gretzky: An Autobiography (New York: HarperCollins, 1990);

Michael LeBlanc, ed., Professional Sports Team Histories: Hockey (Detroit: Gale Research, 1994);

Tim Wendel, Going For The Gold (Westport, Conn.: Lawrence Hill, 1980).

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.

Mark G.Malvasi

See alsoRecreation ; Sports .

Hockey

Southern Exposure

Much to the consternation of Canadian fans, ice hockey moved south in the 1990s as six new National Hockey League (NHL) franchises played in the Sun Belt—the San Jose Sharks (1991), Tampa Bay Lightning (1992), Mighty Ducks of Anaheim (1993), Florida Panthers (1993), Nashville Predators (1998), and Atlanta Thrashers (1999). Only one traditional venue for hockey was added in the decade, the Ottawa Senators (1992). Having gained the Senators, Canada lost the Quebec Nordiques in 1995 when they became the Colorado Avalanche; at the same time the Winnipeg Jets moved to Arizona where they became the Phoenix Coyotes. Completing the southern migration of major league hockey was the relocation of the Hartford Whalers to Raleigh, North Carolina, to become the Carolina Hurricanes. In 1999 one of the southern teams even won the Stanley Cup, the symbol of league supremacy, when the Dallas Stars beat the Buffalo Sabres, four games to two. The southern orientation was the theme for minor league hockey as well. Delightfully named teams sprang up in surprising places where outdoor hockey was impossible: the Austin (Texas) Ice Bats, Waco (Texas) Wizards, Shreveport (Louisiana) Mudbugs, Monroe (Louisiana) Moccasins, Odessa (Texas) Jackalopes, San Antonio (Texas) Iguanas, and Louisiana Ice Gators. These "minor league" teams and arenas were not to be confused with the minor league baseball experience in many of these same Southern

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towns, a laid-back gathering in the bright sunshine attended by a couple thousand baseball lovers and home-team supporters. There was nothing relaxing about the pace or enthusiasm with which these ice hockey teams were embraced by their hosts. Arenas that seated five thousand to twelve thousand people sold out regularly to fun-loving and occasionally rowdy fans, who loved their teams and the minor league prices ($5 per person, for example, with 25¢-hotdog nights).

New Players and Fans

League expansion did not increase the number of talented high school and college recruits to the professional ranks. The results were apparent on the Scoreboard. During the 1997-1998 season, only 5.3 goals per game were scored, the lowest per-game average in forty-two years. Four consecutive years of four-game blowouts for the Stanley Cup title did nothing to help television ratings, which dropped 27 percent during the regular season and 22 percent during the playoffs. U.S. and Canadian talent often took a backseat to players from Russia, the Czech Republic, and Finland. In a move to increase public awareness of the sport in the United States, the NHL allowed a seventeen-day break from league play so players could participate in the Olympics in Nagano, Japan, in 1998, the first Olympics in which professional hockey players were allowed to participate. The ploy may have benefited hockey in other countries, with the Czech Republic beating Russia for the gold medal after beating Canada in the semifinals, but it did little for the sport in the United States. The team behaved badly off the ice, committing thousands of dollars worth of vandalism after a 4 to 1 loss to the Czechs. In marked contrast, the U.S. Women's Hockey Team won the gold at the same Olympiad.

Great Players and Coaches

Wayne Gretzky ("The Great One") retired, after a year as a free agent with the New York Rangers, in 1999 at age thirty-eight. Well past his prime, Gretzky still led the league in assists. In 1997-1998, he became the sixth player in NHL history to lead his team (the Rangers) in goals at age thirty-seven or older. Earlier in the decade, he led the league in assists from 1990 to 1992 and in 1994. He won the Art Ross Trophy (1990, 1991, and 1994) for most points scored, calculated by adding goals made and assists. Lemieux won the award four of the other seven years (1992, 1993, 1996, and 1997), and Jaromir Jagr won the award the other three years (1995, 1998, and 1999). Scotty Bowman, the all-time winningest coach in professional hockey, did not retire and kept on winning games and championships. With 1,300 career victories through the 1999 season, Bowman added three Stanley Cups to his resume (1992—with Pittsburgh, and 1997 and 1998—with Detroit, giving him a total of eight). No other coach, active or inactive, comes close. He had the highest winning percentage as well, at .651. Mike Keenan, whose New York Rangers team won the Stanley Cup in 1994, was second among active coaches in both categories with 597 wins and a .568 winning percentage.

Sources:

NHL.com, Internet website.

The 1999 ESPN Information Please Sports Almanac (New York: Hyperion Press, 1998).

The Sports Illustrated 1999 Sports Almanac (Boston: Little, Brown, 1998).

hockey in Ireland may have its roots in the older game of hurling, and was to absorb the variant of it known as ‘hurley’. Whatever its origins, the modern game emerged prior to 1893, when the Irish Hockey Union (IHU) was founded. The first men's international followed in 1895 against Wales. A cup competition, which is still current, was begun in 1894. The Irish Hurley Union, founded in 1879, and the Ulster Hockey Union (1896) had been subsumed into the IHU by 1898, when interprovincial games began. British army teams were prominent from an early date. The First World War led to the demise of many clubs, and the later withdrawal of troops accelerated hockey's decline. However the provision of new facilities in Dublin from 1934 led to a resurgence. The Second World War isolated Irish hockey, but provided only a short‐term impediment. Despite financial crises in the sport local league and cup competitions continued to flourish, especially in Dublin and Ulster. Women's hockey has developed in parallel to the men's game. The Irish Ladies' Hockey Union was formed in 1894, following a representative game against England. Hockey is currently the most popular women's sport in Ireland.

Neal Garnham

hockey (field hockey) Game played by two teams of 11 players, in which a hooked stick is used to strike a small, solid ball into the opponents' goal. The field of play classically measures 91.47 × 54.9m (300 × 180ft), usually grassed. There are two 35-minute halves. To score, a player must be within the semi-circle marked out in front of the goal. Body contact is forbidden and a ball cannot be hit above shoulder height. The modern game dates from the formation of the English Hockey Association in 1875, and has been an Olympic sport since 1908. Recent developments in the UK include the introduction of a national club league system. See also ice hockey

hock·ey / ˈhäkē/ • n. 1. short for ice hockey. 2. short for field hockey.

hockey XVI (?). of unkn. orig.

hockey •brickie, Dickie, hickey, icky, mickey, Nicky, picky, quickie, rickey, Rikki, sickie, sticky, tricky, Vicky •milky, silky, Wilkie •Chinky, dinky, Helsinki, inky, Kinki, kinky, minke, pinkie, pinky, slinky, stinky, stotinki •frisky, risky, whisky •Dzerzhinsky, Kandinsky, kolinsky, Nijinsky, Stravinsky •doohickey • smart-alecky • garlicky •colicky • gimmicky • panicky • finicky •plasticky •crikey, Nike, psyche, spiky •choccy, cocky, flocky, gnocchi, hockey, jockey, oche, pocky, rocky, schlocky, stocky •conchae, donkey, honky, shonky, wonky •Brodsky •Malinowski, Minkowski, Stokowski, Tchaikovsky •Chomsky • Trotsky • droshky •jabberwocky •balky, chalky, corky, gawky, Gorky, Milwaukee, pawky, porky, talkie, walkie-talkie •Sikorsky • Mussorgsky