hello fic writers and thank you for your service! as both a hockey and HR fan, here are some basics that might be helpful to know:
1. HOW HOCKEY WORKS: hockey games have 3 20-minute periods with intermissions between. the players are sorted into 4 offensive lines (3 players per line: left wing, center, and right wing) and 3 defensive pairs (2 players per line), plus a goaltender or goalie. the lines take turns on the ice, rotating on and off the bench, often while play is ongoing, every 30-90 seconds. that means your characters will usually be playing with the same side characters throughout a game and from one game to the next.
the main exception here is what’s called “special teams” — either defense-heavy lines or offense-heavy lines that take the ice temporarily when a team is up or down a player due to a penalty. common penalties are tripping, hooking, slashing, cross-checking, roughing, and holding. standard penalties are called minor and typically earn someone 2 minutes in the penalty box. fighting gets 5 minutes.
2. press: they don’t usually do sit-down press conferences post game. it’s more likely the broadcast network airing the game will have their reporter snag a goal-scorer or other standout player from the period in the hall between periods or in the locker room afterward for some brief back and forth. it’s often the same reporter(s) for all home games, someone the players get to know and have a professional rapport with.
3. terminology! players usually call each other by nicknames (hollander would prob be hallsy and rozanov prob rozy, hayden might be piker, etc. usually a -y -o or -er suffix.), but this is def a platonic teammate vibe and not romantic/sexual. ilya and shane would absolutely not call each other that in bed but their teammates and coaches would use those nicknames to them directly and to the press. also, jersies are typically referred to as sweaters. those are the ones that pull me out of a fic but other lingo you can use for extra verisimilitude would be helmet = bucket, d-men for defensemen, or netminder for goalie. trash talking is chirping.
4. fights: speaking of chirping, running your mouth might get you into a fight but they are also very protective of rookies and goalies.
5. injuries: when a player is hurt, it’s usually reported they are out with upper-body or lower-body injuries without specifics released publicly. if a player is healthy but not on the roster for a given game, they are a “scratch” or have been “scratched”. injuries are not uncommon but it is uncommon for someone to lose consciousness or need a stretcher off the ice. it happens but it’s rare (but like, use it for the drama as much as you want lol)
6. character names: most teams have a large proportion of players not from the US or Canada. this comes up for me more with self-published hockey romances than i’ve found in fics but there are way fewer Josh Millers and way more Nordic or Slavic names.
7. physicality of celebrations: there’s usually a group hug with all the players on ice when they score, followed by the players on the ice fist bumping the players on the bench (goal scorer goes first). at the end of the game, the winning team lines up to bump foreheads with their goalie. it’s very adorable, look up videos or gifs.
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I’m sure there are things I’m forgetting (and hockey fans, please correct anything i got wrong) but hope this helps and will go back to lurking on ao3!!
some additional clarifications:
1. hockey games cannot end in a tie. they go into overtime (different rules for this in regular season vs playoffs) and then a shootout if OT doesn’t yield a winner.
2. the cup playoffs are structured so that the finals are the winner of the western conference vs the winner of the eastern conference. ottawa and montreal are both eastern conference and would, at closest to the cup, play each other in the conference finals, or the third round of the playoffs. ottawa would then have one more series of games against the western champion to win it all.
3. a backhand shot is flicking the puck with the outside of your stick. players don’t wind up for these, that’s a slapshot. these are most often seen on the move, close to the goal, following some stick handling to get there puck to the outside of their stick. they’re not as powerful or accurate as other shots but they have the element of surprise.
