The Hockey Blog

The Stanley Cup trophy is one of the most recognizable symbols in all of sports. But where did this iconic trophy come from?

From 1942 to 1967, six teams formed the foundation of the NHL, shaping the sport and captivating fans across North America.

An eight-game ice hockey series held in September 1972 between the national teams of Canada and the Soviet Union.

Where did this iconic piece of hockey gear come from, and how did it become such an important part of the sport?

Stan Mikita did not invent the curved hockey stick, but he played an important role in its evolution and popularization.

When it comes to sports, few can match the adrenaline-pumping excitement and sheer intensity of hockey.

While one would expect the Presidents' Trophy to bring luck, history has shown that it often becomes a dreaded omen.

Fighting is not technically allowed in hockey, yet it is still a common occurrence. So why do players do it?

In the world of hockey, there is a widespread belief in the power of "The Hockey Gods."

Long before rulebooks tried to cover every scenario, players policed the game themselves through an informal code of conduct — here's what it actually covers.

Long before the NHL, before the Stanley Cup, before any organized league existed, hockey took its first real step toward becoming a sport with rules — by moving indoors.

The National Hockey League wasn't founded with fanfare or a grand plan — it was founded as a way for a group of team owners to get rid of one person they didn't want to deal with anymore.

For 25 years, the NHL was six teams and nothing more. Then, in a single summer, the league doubled in size — and changed what "the NHL" meant for good.

A team of college kids and amateurs wasn't supposed to beat the greatest hockey team on the planet. Then, for one night in Lake Placid, they did.

For the first time in major North American pro sports history, an entire season was wiped out by a labor dispute. Here's what the lockout was actually about — and how it reshaped the game that came back.

From a single indoor game in 1875 Montreal to a sport played and watched on every continent — hockey's growth over the last 150 years has been remarkable.

Cale Makar just became the first $20 million player in NHL history. Here's what his record deal actually means — and why it's unlikely to be the last one this big.

No defensive system has been booed by more fans than the neutral zone trap — a strategy so effective at killing offense that it helped force the NHL to rewrite its own rulebook.

For decades, goalies stood up and used their skates to stop shots low. Then a generation of netminders started dropping to their knees — and permanently changed the position.

Score three goals in a game and fans throw their hats onto the ice. The tradition's actual origin has nothing to do with hockey at all.

Icing looks like a simple rule on paper. In practice, it's been rewritten specifically to stop players from getting hurt.

Biscuit. Dangle. Sin bin. Hockey has its own entire vocabulary — and some of it has surprisingly specific origins.

Resurfacing a hockey rink used to take a crew of workers well over an hour. Then one Californian solved the problem — and put his own name on it for good.

Before the slap shot, goalies didn't have much to fear from distance. Then players started winding up — and shots started arriving fast enough to genuinely hurt.

There used to be a job on an NHL roster that had almost nothing to do with scoring goals. That job barely exists anymore.

They look almost identical on TV — one player, one goalie, nobody else on the ice. But a penalty shot and a shootout attempt are completely different rules, called for completely different reasons.

It's a small, blue-painted half-circle in front of the net — and for decades, it's been the site of some of hockey's fiercest rules debates.

He was in the stands with a bag of snacks. Twenty minutes later, he was in net for an NHL team, and he ended the night as the game's first star.

One rat, one hockey stick, and one very good night for Scott Mellanby turned into one of the strangest fan traditions in professional sports.

Thick fog rolling off the ice was strange enough. Then a bat started circling the rink, and one player ended the night with a new nickname.

He was a last-minute injury fill-in, playing well enough to win a brand new car as the game's MVP. Then Wayne Gretzky decided to have one of the greatest periods of his career.

Hockey has no shortage of trash talk. This is the one remark that actually got a player suspended the same day he said it — for something that happened nowhere near the ice.

Hockey players talk plenty of trash, but every so often someone delivers a line so sharp it outlives the game it was said in. Here are a few of the best.

Chirping — hockey's own brand of trash talk, on the ice or off it — has produced plenty of memorable lines. None of them come close to what Patrick Roy said about his Stanley Cup rings.

She wandered into the wrong registration line at age nine, got signed up by accident, and played a full season as a star defenseman before anyone realized "Ab Hoffman" wasn't a boy at all.

In the mid-1990s, the Detroit Red Wings turned a Czechoslovakian defensive system into a Presidents' Trophy machine. Then their own coach's old trick beat them in the Final. Here's the system, and how to crack it.

The Charlestown Chiefs and the Hanson Brothers look like pure over-the-top comedy. Almost none of it was made up — it was practically a documentary about minor-league hockey in the 1970s.