Ice Hockey: Difference between revisions

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{{quote|''As the puck travels much too fast for the naked eye to see, spectators are entertained by numerous collisions, bashings, and all-in-brawls.''|'''The Coodabeen Champions Take A Good Hard Look at Australia'''}}

Hockey is to [[Canada Eh|Canada]] (as well as the Northern United States and parts of Europe) what [[The Beautiful Game|association football]] is to the rest of the world. It is an obssession, a [[Serious Business|religion]] that unifies Canadians of every race and colour. It is also our official national winter sport.<ref>Lacrosse, a native American game that's very similar to hockey, is the official national summer sport.</ref> Hockey's true origins are uncertain, but the most widely believed story is that the game was created by a group of British colonists settling in Canada who were trying to create a winter version of rugby. Early versions of the game followed many of the offensive rules of rugby (no forward passes, a large number of players on the ice at once) with the goal-scoring of association football. Years later, the forward pass was added and hockey began to form its own identity, while the game began to grow in popularity throughout Canada.

Hockey is to [[Canada, Eh?|Canada]] (as well as the Northern United States and parts of Europe) what [[The Beautiful Game|association football]] is to the rest of the world. It is an obssession, a [[Serious Business|religion]] that unifies Canadians of every race and colour. It is also our official national winter sport.<ref>Lacrosse, a native American game that's very similar to hockey, is the official national summer sport.</ref> Hockey's true origins are uncertain, but the most widely believed story is that the game was created by a group of British colonists settling in Canada who were trying to create a winter version of rugby. Early versions of the game followed many of the offensive rules of rugby (no forward passes, a large number of players on the ice at once) with the goal-scoring of association football. Years later, the forward pass was added and hockey began to form its own identity, while the game began to grow in popularity throughout Canada.

Before we get to the nitty-gritty, let's go over a few popular misconceptions first. In media (especially American media, but Canadian [[Moral Guardians|"concerned parents' groups"]] are guilty of this as well), ice hockey is often portrayed as a combination of [[Professional Wrestling]] and a pub brawl <small>[[Recycled in Space|ON ICE!]]</small> that's only watched by maple-syrup drinking Canadians who riot whenever they lose. That's... not really the case (for one thing there's a lot of rabid American hockey fans out there, especially in the honourary Canadian provinces of Minnesota and Michigan. For another, riots are atypical.) Although there is a grain of truth, as with all stereotypes: