History of Ice Hockey

Origins

The exact origins of hockey played on ice are unclear. It is almost certain that it developed from hockey, also known as 'field', or 'lawn' hockey.

Canada claims to be the starting point of ice hockey. Several Canadian cities claim to have played the game first, Kingston (now called Ontario) and Montreal.

In fact, it was played on Kingston harbour in 1860, when it was frozen over, by Crimea War veterans who used the rules of standard hockey, but played with a puck instead of a ball. This was the first time that a puck was used.

British troops also played hockey on ice at around the same time in Nova Scotia.

In 1879, WF Robertson and RF Smith, who were students at McGill University in Montreal, formulated the first set of rules, which were a cross between 'field' hockey and rugby rules.

Robertson had visited England to watch standard hockey being played, and went with the intention of adapting the rules to be played on ice. The first rules stipulated a square rubber puck, and nine players per side.

Organized games

In 1880 the first recognized (ice) hockey team was formed, the McGill University Hockey Club.

Five years later, a member of the McGill team, AP Low, introduced the game to Ottawa.

Soon after the McGill club was formed, there were more teams formed, and there were soon leagues throughout Canada. By the time the first ice hockey club was formed in the United States in 1893, there were nearly 100 clubs in the Montreal area.

The first game in the United States was between Yale University and Johns Hopkins University in Baltimore.

Also in 1893, Lord Stanley of Preston, the Governor-General of Canada donated the Stanley Cup to be played for every year.

The Montreal Amateur Athletic Association were the first winners (in 1894) when they won 3-1 against the Ottawa Capitals in front of 5,000 spectators.

The Stanley Cup became and still is the most famous trophy in this sport.

The spread of the game

In 1896 the United States Amateur Hockey League was formed. By the start of the twentieth century, ice hockey was being played in Europe. This was largely due to a Canadian team touring Britain in 1903, and also a five-nation tournament, also played in Britain, in the same year.

Hockey had been played on ice in Britain since the end of the nineteenth century, mostly on Wimbledon Common in London.

In 1895 there was a famous match on a frozen lake in the Buckingham Palace grounds between a Palace team and a Lord Stanley team. The Prince of Wales (later King Edward VII) and the Duke of York (later King George V) were on the Palace team.

The result was reported as 'Numerous goals for the Stanley team to the single goal of the Palace side.'

The International Ice Hockey Federation (IIHF) was formed in 1908 and its founder members were Belgium, Bohemia, France, Great Britain and Switzerland. Two years later, Great Britain won the first European Ice Hockey Championship, played at Les Avants in the Swiss Alps.

Despite this, the British Ice Hockey Association was not formed until four years after the British team's victory. The five founder members of this were Cambridge, Manchester, Oxford Canadians, Royal Engineers, and Princes.

A world and Olympic championship was first held in 1920, when Canada won both titles at the 1920 Olympics. A separate world championship was started in 1930.

In 1936 Britain won the gold medal for ice hockey at the Garmisch Olympics, when they held the United States to a goalless draw, and beat Canada 2-1. In the period between the two world wars, ice hockey became extremely popular in Britain as a spectator sport.

There were many new rinks built, and an influx of Canadian players into the British League. However, after the Second World War, the game became less popular, but it continued to grow in other countries like Sweden, Finland, the then Soviet Union, and the then Czechoslovakia.

Britain does still have an ice hockey league, the British League, consisting of the Premier Division, and Division One.

Today, there are more countries which play ice hockey alongside the more established European and North American teams, Australia, Greece, India, North Korea, and South Korea to name but a few.

NHL

The National Hockey League is the sport's major professional league. It covers Canada and the United States.

The first all-professional club in North America was the Portlage Lake club in Michigan, which was formed in 1903, although there had been individual professionals in Canada before then.

The first professional league was the International Hockey League which ran in northern Michigan between 1904 and 1906. The first fully professional league was formed in Ontario in 1908.

Until 1910, amateur and professional players were allowed to play together in 'mixed teams', but this ended when the first major professional league was founded in eastern Canada in 1910. It was called the National Hockey Association (NHA).

On the west coast of Canada, ice hockey was played in the Pacific Coast League, which was formed in 1911.

Seattle and other American teams joined the NHA and the Stanley Cup became the trophy awarded to winners of the professional play-offs and not 'mixed teams' as it had been before.

The National Hockey League (NHL) was formed in 1917, after a meeting in Montreal, and it replaced the NHA.

There were only four teams in the league in the first season, the Wanderers and Canadiens from Montreal, and the Ottawa Senators, and the Toronto Arenas, who became the first league champions. They later became the Toronto Maple Leafs.

The first American team to join the NHL, the Boston Bruins, did so in 1924.

By 1943, the league had acquired a group of the 'Big Six', the Boston Bruins, Chicago Black Hawks, Detroit Red Wings, Montreal Canadiens, New York Rangers, and Toronto Maple Leafs.

The champions received the Prince Of Wales trophy, and the leading four teams contested each other in the post-season playoffs for the Stanley Cup.

There was a greater interest in potential franchises over the next quarter of a century, and in the 1967-68 season, the league was expanded to 12 teams. The new teams were the Minnesota North Stars, Oakland Seals, Philadelphia Flyers, Pittsburgh Penguins, and St. Louis Blues.

The new clubs formed a Western Division, while the original clubs became part of the Eastern Division, regardless of geography.

Today, the 21 teams of the NHL are divided into two Conferences, the Wales Conference and the Campbell Conference. Each Conference has two divisions.

The Wales Conference is divided into the Patrick and Adams Divisions, the Campbell Conference is divided into the Norris and Smythe Divisions. They are all named after famous hockey owners of the past.

The NHL season lasts from October to May. After playing 80 games in a regular season, the leading teams in each Division enter the playoffs and the winners meet in the two Conference finals. The two Conference winners then meet in the best-of-seven Stanley Cup final.

Ice Hockey

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