The roots of Hockey as a sport go back hundreds of years, and possibly longer. I realise that may be a surprise to some of you, but the early images of a picture painted from the 1500s of a painting by Pietr Bruegel entitled “Hunters in the Snow” showing skaters carrying curved sticks with one of them about to contact a small object on the ice. There is more evidence tracing the game back to Mesopotamia from the third millennium B.C. showing men with again curved sticks chasing a ring in the dirt.
Naturally, this may not necessarily lead towards what we now love as our Country’s favorite past-time. Research further points to North America as being the origin of our idea of using ice and a structured contest to form the sport we know today. Library and Archives Canada say that the International Ice Hockey Federation has endorsed a longstanding Montreal claim. It is based on documented evidence, in newspapers, of a specific game between two teams of identified members and a recorded score. The match was played at the city’s Victoria rink on March 3, 1875. No earlier descriptions of an actual “game” of hockey with a recorded score have ever been found. They go on to say that it ended in a brawl. Imagine that!
Wikipedia calls ice hockey a contact team sport played on ice, usually in a rink, in which two teams of skaters use their sticks to shoot a vulcanized rubber puck into their opponent’s net to score points. It continues to say the sport is known to be fast-paced and physical, with teams usually consisting of six players each; one goaltender, and five players who skate up and down the ice trying to take the puck and score a goal against the opposing team.
This is a good definition, but, it does not nearly give enough information on the intricacies of the game including each of the other people needed to make the games so involved. There are of course time-keepers, officials and of course the fans! Let’s not forget them! It is probably a good bet that most of those reading this already have a favorite team. It is also probably another good bet that at least ninety percent of those are Canadian teams. Many fans from Canada feel that if their own team does not make the finals that hopefully another team from Canada will! Such is the love of the “Home” game.
The NHL season for those of you who may not follow Canada’s game is concluded from year to year with the winning team receiving the Stanley Cup. This date’s back to 1892 and was named after Lord Stanley of Preston who was Governor General of Canada at that time. This explanation shows not even a glimmer of the nail-biting action and fun that goes into cheering on the teams involved, let alone any of the hard work and training that goes into making the players the top representatives of their sport.
Canadians naturally make up the highest percentage of players in the recognized sport of NHL hockey today. In the most part it is really our game, right? Their numbers have certainly gone down recently to just slightly under fifty percent of all players, from, in earlier years much higher amounts since the increasing popularity of the sport world-wide.
From fans to players who are now able to make a living at the game, the love of this incredible sport has grown in leaps and bounds in the last fifty years. This increase is naturally due in the most part to the use of television and the internet. People, who previously had no chance of getting to know and understand the sport, now have the ability to watch and learn of the game at the tips of their fingers, on the remote or computer keys.
The interest only seems to continue to grow world-wide, however, no matter what our percentage of players or the number of fans from other countries, we will continue to view this as Canada’s game. Hockey lives here! Love where you live!