carve your name into my chest: hockey glossary
All-Stars: marking the midway point of the season in early February, a weekend where players compete in various skills challenges on Friday night and then play in a divisional championship on Saturday, with teams made up of members from each division.
Barn burner: an intense or faced paced or just truly exciting game from start to finish.
Battle of the Blades: A Canadian TV show that pairs up experienced figure skaters with (retired) hockey players in a Dancing with the Stars style pairs figure skating competition. (yes, this is real and you can watch clips on youtube)
Beaut: hockey slang, short for beauty/beautiful. great, awesome, etc. 'a beaut of a goal' is 'a fucking awesome goal'.
Bench / box: where players who aren’t currently on the ice sit and wait for their turn to play. Some players spend most of the game on the bench, others rotate out more frequently. Players taking a penalty are also “benched”.
Calder Trophy: Awarded to the best rookie in the NHL.
CBC: the Canadian Broadcasting Corporation, the oldest and largest broadcasting network in Canada.
Check: a defensive technique aimed towards a player who is in possession of the puck. there are many forms of checks, though the most commonly known is when a player uses his shoulders and hips to knock the other player into the boards, separating him from the puck.
Chirping (or chirps): teasing, making fun of, specifically in a witty or particularly cutting remark. Also called sniping, sometimes.
Chute: Where players line up to wait before they take the ice.
Crease: the blue area directly in front of the net. Other players cannot make contact with the goalie inside of the crease.
Deke / deking: Short for decoy. A type of feint where the player who has the puck acts in a way to confuse another player, typically a defenseman or goalie.
Dusters: players who don’t get much play time, they gather dust on the bench. Also used to call players losers or as just a general insult.
D zone: the defense zone, the area behind the blue line that contains each teams nets.
Face off: beginning of the game/period/play. The ref will drop the puck between two players, who use their sticks to try to gain control of the puck.
Five hole: the space between a goalie’s legs.
Gretzky / Ovechkin / Howe: Wayne Gretzky, Alex Ovechkin, Gordie Howe. Three of the greatest hockey players in the world, and so far the only three NHL players to score over 800 career goals.
Hat trick: when one player scores three goals in one game. At the end of the game, the audience throws all their hats onto the ice in celebration.
Instigator: all players involved in fights receive 5 minute "major" penalties, but the person who is deemed to have started the fight (by being the aggressor, removing their gloves first, or another reason) is given an additional 2 minute minor penalty. the NHL is the most lenient league in terms of allowing fighting.
Jumper: a hockey jersey, your team uniform.
Lamplighter: a goal, named after the lamp that lights up behind the net to indicate the puck has gone in.
Line: either offensive or defensive, the players you skate the most with in your "shift" on the ice (a three man offensive line includes a center and both a right and left wing; a defensive line has two players).
Period: hockey games have three twenty minute periods of play, separated by two fifteen minute intermissions.
Playoffs: the Stanley Cup Playoffs. in each division (grouping of regional teams), the top three teams (plus an additional two wild card teams per conference) have the opportunity to skate in the playoff season.
Plexi: the clear barrier above the boards which stops flying pucks from hitting audience members.
Powerplay: during a penalty where only one team has a skater benched, so the other team has their full team on the ice and thus one more player than the other team. this gives them an advantage and increased opportunity to score.
Rookie: a new player, their first year playing for the NHL.
Shutout: a game in which the goalie(s) stops all goals from entering the net.
Sin bin: the penalty box. players who commit penalties are “benched” for varying amounts of time based on the penalty (2, 5, and 10 minute long penalties exist for different infractions)
Slapshot: a powerful and highspeed shot. good for shooting from further away because of the speed, but is slower due to the need of the player to “wind up” and is often less accurate than, say, a wrist shot. fun fact: the goal is not to actually slap the puck, but to slap the ice behind the puck which bends the stick and stores up even more energy, which is then released when the stick connects with the puck, sending it flying at speeds of more than 160 km/h (that’s 100 miles per hour, for you non-Canadians)!
Snow: to snow someone. when you skate to a stop quickly in front of another player (usually a goalie) and send a cloud of ice chips (snow) into their face. if a goalie is snowed while they're on the ground, players can receive a penalty for this.
Stanley Cup: the hockey trophy to end all hockey trophies.
Ten and two: slang for when a player gets a ten minute penalty on top of a regular two minute penalty (often for instigating a fight or fighting dirty). A ten minute penalty is a game misdemeanour, and means the player is benched for the remainder of the game.
Three on Three: a variation style of hockey where there are only three players on the ice (plus a goalie) at any given time, compared to hockey’s usual five (plus goalie). typically the best strategy in a three on three game is to have two forwards and one defenseman. because there are less players, less of the ice is covered, so players can often keep the puck in possession longer. in the all-stars three on three games, they play two ten minute periods with one intermission in the middle, instead of the typical three twenty minute periods with two intermissions.
Timbit League: To summarize: one of the most famous Canadian institutions is the coffee & donut shop Tim Hortons (named after Canadian hockey player Tim Horton, who founded the chain). Their quality has gone majorly downhill in the last ten years, but I digress. At Tims, the small round "donut holes" are called "timbits", and they continue to be delicious. The Tim Hortons franchise is a major sponsor of youth camps and sports across Canada, mostly for kids under 9, which helps pay for equipment, uniforms, and more through fundraising, to ensure all kids have access to sports. Kids who play in these leagues are affectionately called Timbits, as they proudly show on their uniforms, and their leagues are Timbit Leagues.
Top shelf: the top area of the net, above the goalies shoulders.
Winter Classic: an outdoors game played around New Years.
NHL: the National Hockey League, the major professional hockey league in North America. originally a Canadian league, hence the "National", it expanded into the states first with the Boston Bruins and now has over 32 teams between Canada and the US.
Eastern conference / Western conference: Groupings of teams that are close together regionally. All teams face all other teams in the NHL at least twice a season, but teams in the same conference will face each other many more times. They’re also vying for spots in the Stanley Cup Playoffs, as each conference can only send 8 teams (3 per division + 2 wild cards) based on the number of games they win and goals they score throughout the season. Conferences are divided up again into divisions, with Eastern having the Atlantic and Metropolitan divisions, and Western having Central and Pacific.
The Bruins: The Boston Bruins, a hockey team based in Boston. Also sometimes called “the black and golds” for their team colours.
The Habs: The Montreal Canadiens nickname, for “les habitants” or maybe just “hockey” due to the confusing H in their logo.
Canucks: Hockey team: Vancouver Canucks.
Devils: Hockey team: New Jersey Devils.
Hurricanes: Hockey team: Carolina Hurricanes
Islanders: One of New York’s two hockey teams. The other is the New York Rangers.
Leafs: Hockey team: Toronto Maple Leafs. Worst team with the most rabid fan base, despite their constant proclivity to embarrass everyone by choking every year.
Oilers: Hockey team: Edmonton Oilers.
Panthers: Hockey team: Florida Panthers.
Penguins: Hockey team: Pittsburgh Penguins.
Sabres: Hockey team: Buffalo Sabres
Sens: Hockey team: Ottawa Senators.
Toronto Six: Hockey team: a professional women's hockey team based out of Toronto. one of two Canadian teams in the Premier Hockey Foundation, which is the current professional women's league in North America.
