or her foot to sweep the feet out from under the other player, causing the player to fall backward. The offending player is assessed a minor penalty for tripping. Such fouls most commonly occur in traffic in front of the net or following a faceoff.
• Snowplow: To hook a player, usually between the bluelines.
• Spinnerama: A deft manoeuvre in which the puck carrier turns 360 degrees in an attempt to evade defenders.
Who was the last goaltender to play without a mask in the NHL?
The Pittsburgh Penguins’ Andy Brown was the last NHL goalie to bare his face to slap shots and other on-ice hazards. Brown played his last NHL game with the Penguins in a 6–3 loss to the Atlanta Flames on April 7, 1974. The plucky, or crazy, netminder continued his professional career in the World Hockey Association with the Indianapolis Racers, and he didn’t wear a mask there, either. Brown, like the Philadelphia Flyers’ Ron Hextall, had something of a mean streak. In 1973–74 with the Penguins he achieved the then single-season NHL penalty-minute record for goalies, notching 60. He continued his warring ways in the WHA the next season, leading all goalies in that league that year with 75 penalty minutes. Incidentally, the current NHL record holder for penalty minutes for a goalie in one season is Hextall, who earned himself 113 in 1988–89 while playing for the Flyers. Hextall also has the career record for penalty minutes — 584.
Top Five Soviet Players Who Never Played in the NHL
• Vsevolod Bobrov: A forward, he played hockey in the Soviet Union from 1946 through 1957, then coached the Soviet national team, including its games in the 1972 Summit Series. Also a soccer star, Bobrov was one of his country’s first genuine hockey heroes and was often compared to Maurice Richard. He was part of two World Championships and one Olympic-gold effort.
• Anatoli Firsov: One of the Soviet Union’s earliest superstars, Firsov played left wing and centre from 1958 through 1974. He was part of eight World Championships and three gold-medal Olympic teams. Firsov boycotted the 1972 Summit Series in support of ousted national team coach Anatoli Tarasov. It’s often thought that his absence on the Soviets’ Summit Series team was the equivalent of Canada’s inability to put Bobby Hull on the ice.
• Valeri Kharlamov: An eight-time World Champion and three-time Olympic goldmedal winner, Kharlamov, a forward, made his Canadian debut during the 1972 Summit Series and astonished the North American hockey world with his prodigious talent. Kharlamov played for the Soviet national team from 1967 through 1981, his career cut short when he was killed in a car accident.
• Vladislav Tretiak: A 10-time world champion and three-time Olympic gold-medal winner, Tretiak was the Soviet Union’s greatest ever goaltender during his career from 1968 through 1984. He played brilliantly in the 1972 Summit Series and later went on to stymie many North American teams in international competitions. He was the first Soviet-trained player to be inducted into the Hockey Hall of Fame.
• Valeri Vasiliev: A nine-time world champion and two-time Olympic gold-medal winner, Vasiliev, the Soviet Union’s greatest defenceman, played from 1967 through 1982.
Which NHL player was the last to play without a helmet?
The days of seeing an NHL player’s hair or lack of it on the ice started to be numbered in the 1970s, especially after the league made it mandatory in 1979 for all players entering the NHL to don one. Anyone already in the league at that time could still go helmetless if they so desired. Centreman Craig MacTavish, once an integral part of the Edmonton Oilers in the late 1980s and the early 1990s, continued to display his greying locks until his final game with the St. Louis Blues during the 1997 Stanley Cup playoffs.
Which player in the NHL invented the curved hockey stick?
The Chicago Black Hawks’ Bobby Hull and Stan Mikita are often credited with first using hockey sticks with curved blades. According to the game’s lore, in the early 1960s Mikita noticed that his broken stick blade, which formed a curve, allowed him to shoot higher and harder. Soon after, Mikita and his teammate Hull were terrifying opposing goalies with shots propelled by huge “banana blade” curves. So dangerous were these shots that the stick blade’s curve is now limited to a half inch. Many hockey historians currently believe, however, that right winger Andy Bathgate, one of the first NHL players to employ the slap shot, was the first to tinker with curving his sticks even before he got to the big league. Bathgate, who played many of his best years with the New York Rangers in the 1950s and early 1960s, told a reporter once: “I would heat up the blades with hot water, then I would bend them. I would put them in the toilet-stall door jamb and leave them overnight. The next day they would have a hook in them.” To prevent his sticks from straightening out, Bathgate added fibreglass to his blades, likely the first player to do so.
Where did the word deke come from?
A deke is an action that involves the puck carrier faking a move in one direction and then taking the puck in another direction. Dekes are commonly used to move the puck past defenders or to score on goalies. Deke is a short form of decoy.
Quickies …
Did you know …
that the New York Rangers’ Andy Bathgate was the right winger who drilled a puck into Montreal Canadiens goalie Jacques Plante’s face on November 1, 1959, causing the superstar netminder to don a face mask, an action that changed forever the way goalies played the game?
What is a power play in hockey?
A power play occurs in hockey when a team, because of penalties to the opposition, has more players on the ice than the other team. The numerical advantage enjoyed by the team on the power play affords it a good opportunity to score. Most teams dedicate much time to practising their power plays. The secret of a good power play is the ability to control the puck in the attacking zone until it can be moved into position for a shot. In the NHL, power plays are successful about 15 to 18 percent of the time.
How does an offside occur in hockey?
An offside infraction occurs when an attacking player crosses the opponent’s blueline ahead of the puck. The offside is hockey’s most commonly called infraction and is intended to prevent a player from camping out in the attacking zone without the puck. The position of the player’s skates, not the stick, determines an offside. For the player to be offside, both skates must be completely over the blueline when the puck fully crosses it. After an offside is called, a faceoff occurs outside the blueline where the infraction took place. Until the 2005–06 season a two-line pass (crossing the centre redline and the opponent’s blueline) to a teammate was also considered an offside. However, the NHL legalized such passes, hoping they would open up the game, create more breakaways, and lead to more frequent scoring chances. Critics of the rule change, though, feel that the opposite has occurred and that the lack of a viable redline promotes greater use of the neutral-zone trap and more defensive hockey. A delayed offside occurs when an attacking player has preceded the puck across his opponent’s blueline and is offside but the defensive team takes possession of the puck at or near the blueline. Play is allowed to continue as the defensive team moves the puck out of its zone (and, therefore, nullifies the offside), or if an attacking player touches the puck inside the blueline.
When
