Score!: The Action and Artistry of Hockey's Magnificent Moment
Like the modern game the point of hockey in its early days was to score goals But scoring was not always the most important part of the day Hockey games were great social occasions Young men and women would spend the time between periods eating drinking and getting to know one another Then the young men would skate back onto the ice and continue the game The game itself was played very differently too In Canada teams usually had seven players to a side There was a goalie two point men or defensemen three forwards and a rover Modern teams have six players a side The rover no longer exists He was a versatile player who did many different jobs for his team Usually he skated to the place on the ice where he was needed most The job of the point men was to capture the puck Then they would flip it as high as they could toward the other end of the rink The forwards would wait for the puck to come down and then try to slap it toward the goal If the defense stopped the shot or intercepted the pass the puck would be flipped high in the 8 SCORE
air in the opposite direction The point men sometimes moved very little in early contests The poor forwards by contrast spent the entire game skating up and down the rink Despite all the differences the way goals are scored has never changed A skater still tries to smack the puck into an opening at the mouth of the goal The goalie job is to stop the shot Sometimes it is a game of cat and mouse Offensive players attempt to outguess defenders until the instant the shot is taken In this case the goalie must hold his ground until he knows for sure who is taking the shot He must also be ready if an opponent tries to deflect or redirect a teammate s shot And even if a goalie is able to block a shot he must pounce on the puck immediately Many goals are scored on these rebounds The shots used during the early days of hockey were almost identical to modern shots That s because a hard accurate shot has always been a goal scorer s most important weapon The one shot that old time players did not use was a big slap shot It didn't become part of the game until the 1950s However players have been slapping shots at the net with tremendous speed for more than one hundred years They just didn t wind up the way current players do Early stars like Harry Trihey Haviland Routh Harry Smith and Russell Bowie all had powerful shots They set the stage for the great goal scorers to come How did pro hockey get its start During the 1880s players started forming the first teams and leagues Hockey soon became popular enough for organized teams to pay players Before that hockey had been an amateur sport Players took the ice simply for the love of the game When teams started selling tickets to games they could afford to pay the best players A top scorer could earn many times more than an erage worker So the best players made hockey their job When players began scoring goals for a living they worked even harder at their craft As a result their skill level rose quickly Talented stickhandlers like Joe Malone and Odie Cleghorn could work their way past several opponents and then Lighting the lamp
send the puck through the slimmest of openings for a goal A defenseman named Harry Cameron learned how to score goals on long shots from the point much as modern defensemen do Pro hockey also saw the arrival of speedy skaters like Cyclone Taylor Jack Laviolette Newsy Lalonde and Didier Pitre Taylor would bring crowds to their feet as he scooped up the puck behind his own net and then charged up the ice to score Pitre was pro hockey s fastest skater and had one of the game s best wrist shots His team had to put a wire screen behind the goal to protect the fans These exciting stars helped form the backbone of the Pacific Coast Hockey Association PCHA which began in 1911 and the National Hockey League NHL which played its first season in 1917 1918 The two powerful leagues competed to sign the top players in North America At the end of each season the league champions played for the Stanley Cup By the 1920s pro hockey was more popular than ever It was also heading for trouble The competition for good players was driving salaries higher and higher The population on Canada s West Coast was not large There were not enough fans in the region to support the growing number of teams In the East there were plenty of fans but the arenas were too small Pro hockey was doing great and going broke The sport found the solution to its problem in the United States There the country was experiencing the Golden Age of Sports Great athletes had become D PITRE or CANADIACLU A Didier Pitre trading card 10 SCORE
national heroes Fans flocked to games to watch them play The popularity of college and high school hockey incr reased Meanwhile cities across the nation built big arenas that could be used for many different sports and activities Hockey fans in the United States were hungry for a new professional league and new stars to root for Lord Stanley Starting in 1925 the NHL began moving teams south of the Canadian border The New York Rangers Chicago Blackhawks Boston Bruins and Detroit Red Wings were all formed during this period Soon hockey was the most popular indoor sport in these cities When the PCHA went out of business and its best players joined NHL clubs the quality of hockey rose to incredible levels Chicago got many of its players from Oregon s Portland Rosebuds Detroit s best players came from the Cougars in Victoria British Columbia Boston recruited many top western players including Eddie Shore He was the Bruins first great star Since 1892 the championship of North American hockey has been the Stanley Cup The Stanley Cup is a bowl or cup that sits atop several rows of silver rings Each of these rings lists the names of the players from each championship team When filled with names a ring is a new one is added The trophy got its name from Frederick Arthur Stanley right He was the governor general of Canada from 1888 to 1893 Lord Stanley as he was known loved hockey So did his wife Lady Constance Their children were skilled players Stanley donated the cup shockey s greatest prize At first the Stanley Cup was awarded to Canada s best amateur club The team that possessed the Cup could accept or reject a challenge from another club at any time In some years three or four Stanley Cup championships took place By 1909 the best players and teams had turned professional Beginning that year the Stanley Cup became the championship trophy of pro hockey In 1915 the Stanley Cup was awarded to the winner of a series between the champion from the PCHA and the champion from eastern Canada From 1918 to 1926 the NHL champion played the western champion for the Stanley Cup When pro hockey in the West died the Stanley Cup remained the championship trophy of the NHL The Ottawa Senators won the first Stanley Cup series between two NHL teams in 1927 As of 2009 the Montreal Canadiens had won 24 Stanley Cups more than any other
