Ice hockey ::: Project ETERNITY

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Ice hockey, known simply as "hockey" in areas where it is more common than field hockey, is a team sport played on ice. It is known as the fastest team sport in the world, with players on skates capable of going high speeds along with shots of the "puck" sometimes going over 100 mph (160 km/h).

Game

The objective of the game is to score goals by playing a hard rubber disc, the puck, into one of the goal nets placed at opposite ends of the playing surface called a rink. The players may control the puck using a long stick with a blade, that may or may not be curved, at one end. Players may also redirect or kick the puck with a skate (but not kick it into the goal) or with the hand (without closing the hand or passing to a teammate in the offensive zone). A player scoring three goals in a single game is said to have scored a hat trick, thus named because fans celebrate the accomplishment by throwing their hats on the ice. If the three goals are scored consecutively, the player is said to have scored a natural hat trick, although this expression has fallen out of common usage.

A team consists of at most 23 players of whom two have to be goaltenders. At most six players from each team may be on the ice at the same time. Usually one of the six is a goaltender (or goalie) who wears special protective equipment and is positioned in front of the net. The goaltender is allowed to immobilize the puck with his hands or body. Doing so is called "freezing" the puck, and results in a face-off

The other five players are divided into three forwards and two defensemen. The forward positions are named left wing, center and right wing. Until recently forwards typically were played as units or lines, with the same three forwards always playing together. It is becoming common, however, for only the wingers to play together consistently. The Defensemen usually stay together as a pair but may change less frequently than the forwards. Another innovation in lineups was the torpedo system which the Swedish briefly toyed with; it consisted of four defensive role players, and a "torpedo" player who cruised near the blue line, even when the play was in the team's defensive end. The four defensive players would then essentially play the game as they would a power play, hoping to capitalize on a quick liberating pass to their torpedo, to give him a one on zero opportunity. This innovation provided them with limited, and has largely been dropped, as opponents found ways to declaw the system.

Ice hockey is a fast-paced game, and player substitutions may happen every few minutes or less, often during gameplay. In fact, line changes spaced around a minute apart are often deemed ideal to allow players to conserve enough energy to last the entire game. The boards surrounding the ice help keep the puck in play, and play often proceeds for minutes without interruption. When play is stopped, it is restarted with a faceoff. There are two rules of play in ice hockey that limit the movement of the puck: offside and icing.

The remaining characteristics of the game often depend on the particular code of play being used. The two most important codes are those of the International Ice Hockey Federation (IIHF) and of the North American National Hockey League (NHL), often considered the world's top professional league. North American hockey codes tend to bear much more resemblance to the NHL code.

Penalties

In men's hockey, but not in women's, a player may use his hip or shoulder to hit another player if the player has the puck or has just passed it. This use of the hip and shoulder is called body checking. Not all physical contact is legal, as there are many infractions that a player may be assessed a penalty for. His team would have to play without him for a short amount of time, and the other team would have a power play.

Tactics

An important defensive tactic is checking – attempting to take the puck from an opponent or to remove the opponent from play. Forechecking is checking in the other team's zone, backchecking is checking while the other team is advancing down the ice toward one's own goal. Stick checking, sweep checking, and poke checking are legal uses of the stick to obtain possession of the puck. Body checking is using one's shoulder or hip to strike an opponent who has the puck or who has just passed it.

When a player directs the puck towards the opponents' goal he or she is said to shoot the puck. A one-time shot is a shot which redirects a pass towards the target by striking the puck immediately rather than receiving the pass and shooting in two separate actions. A deke (short for decoy) is a feint with the body and/or stick to fool a defender or the goalie. Headmanning the puck is the tactic of always passing to the player farthest down the ice.

A team that is losing by one or two goals in the last few minutes of play may elect to pull the goalie, that is, removing the goaltender and replacing him or her with an extra attacker on the ice in the hope of gaining enough advantage to score a goal. However, this tactic is extremely risky, and as often as not leads to the winning team scoring a goal in the empty net.

Although it is officially prohibited in the rules, at the professional level fights are sometimes used to affect morale of the teams with aggressors hoping to demoralize the opposing players while exciting his own team. Toronto Maple Leafs owner Conn Smythe famously observed that "If you can't beat 'em in the alley you can't beat 'em on the ice."

Periods and overtime

A game consists of three periods of twenty minutes each, the clock running only when the puck is in play. In international play, the teams change ends for the second period, again for the third period, and again after ten minutes of the third period. In North American play, the last change is omitted.

Various procedures are used if a game is tied. In tournament play, North Americans favour sudden death overtime, in which the teams continue to play until a goal is scored. In regular season play in the National Hockey League, the teams play a single five-minute sudden death overtime period, with the added stipulation that each side can play with a maximum of five players (four skaters and a goaltender) on the ice during the overtime. A regular season game that is tied after the overtime ends tied. International play uses an overtime period followed by a shootout if the score remains tied after the extra period; the shootout consists of five players from each team taking penalty shots against the other team's goaltender until one team has the preponderance of successful shots.

Women's hockey

The chief difference between women's and men's hockey is that bodychecking is not allowed in women's hockey. After the 1990 Women's World Championship, bodychecking was eliminated because women in many countries do not have the size and mass seen in North American players.