0_Wizard
Ice hockey is popular in colder places such as Canada and Scandinavia, however it is less often seen in countries as my own such as the United Kingdom. 
Ice hockey is most popular in Canada, central and eastern Europe, Scandinavia, Russia and the United States.
chosen_Ice_hockey_0
Ice hockey
chosen_topic_0_Ice_hockey
Ice hockey
Ice hockey is a contact team sport played on ice, usually in a rink, in which two teams of skaters use their sticks to shoot a vulcanized rubber puck into their opponent's net to score points. The sport is known to be fast-paced and physical, with teams usually consisting of six players each: one goaltender, and five players who skate up and down the ice trying to take the puck and score a goal against the opposing team. Ice hockey is most popular in Canada, central and eastern Europe, Scandinavia, Russia and the United States. Ice hockey is the official national winter sport of Canada, and enjoys immense popularity; alongside Canada, ice hockey is the most popular winter sport in Belarus, Croatia, the Czech Republic, Finland, Latvia, Russia, Slovakia, Sweden, and Switzerland.
Sport in the United Kingdom
The United  Kingdom has given birth to a range of major international sports including: association football, rugby (union and league), cricket, netball, darts, golf, tennis, table tennis, badminton, squash, bowls, modern rowing, hockey, boxing, snooker, billiards, and curling. This has meant that in the infancy of many sports, England, Scotland, Wales and Ireland formed among the earliest separate governing bodies, national teams and domestic league competitions. After 1922 some sports formed separate bodies for Northern Ireland though some continued to be organised on an all-Ireland basis. In a small number of sports, these teams are supplemented by high-profile events featuring a combined team representing one or more nations.
Norway
Norway ( ; Norwegian: (Bokmål) or (Nynorsk); ), officially the Kingdom of Norway, is a sovereign state and unitary monarchy whose territory comprises the western portion of the Scandinavian Peninsula plus the remote island of Jan Mayen and the archipelago of Svalbard. The Antarctic Peter I Island and the sub-Antarctic Bouvet Island are dependent territories and thus not considered part of the Kingdom. Norway also lays claim to a section of Antarctica known as Queen Maud Land. Until 1814, the kingdom included the Faroe Islands, Greenland, and Iceland. It also included Bohuslän until 1658, Jämtland and Härjedalen until 1645, Shetland and Orkney until 1468, and the Hebrides and Isle of Man until 1266.
Street hockey
Street hockey (also known as dek hockey, ball hockey, and in some parts of Canada road hockey) is a variation of the sport of ice hockey where the game is played outdoors on foot, or with inline or roller skates using a ball or puck. Both ball and puck are typically designed to be played on non-ice surfaces. The object of the game is to score more goals than the opposing team by shooting the ball or puck into the opposing team's net. Street hockey in pickup form is generally played under the following guidelines, since there are no "official rules" for local pickup hockey:   In its most pure form, street hockey is always played on an outdoor surface (very often a street, parking lot, tennis court or other asphalt surface), thus the genesis of the name street hockey.
Sweden
Sweden ( ; ), officially the Kingdom of Sweden (Swedish: ), is a Scandinavian country in Northern Europe. It borders Norway to the west and north and Finland to the east, and is connected to Denmark in the southwest by a bridge-tunnel across the Öresund. At , Sweden is the third-largest country in the European Union by area. Sweden has a total population of 10 million of which 2.3 million has a foreign background. It has a low population density of ; the highest concentration is in the southern half of the country. Approximately 85% of the population lives in urban areas. Germanic peoples have inhabited Sweden since prehistoric times, emerging into history as the Geats (Swedish Götar) and Swedes (Svear) and constituting the sea peoples known as the Norsemen.
Bandy
Bandy is a team winter sport played on ice, in which skaters use sticks to direct a ball into the opposing team's goal. Based on the number of participating athletes, bandy is the world's second most popular winter sport after ice hockey. Bandy is also the number two winter sport in tickets sold per day of competitions at the sport's world championship compared to the other winter sports. The sport is considered a form of hockey and has a common background with association football, ice hockey and field hockey. Like football, the game is normally played in halves of 45 minutes each, there are eleven players on each team, and the bandy field is about the same size as a football pitch.
Vikings
Vikings (Old English: "wicing"—"pirate", Danish and ; Swedish and ; , from Old Norse) were Norse seafarers, mainly speaking the Old Norse language, who raided and traded from their Northern European homelands across wide areas of northern, central, eastern and western Europe, during the late 8th to late 11th centuries. The term is also commonly extended in modern English and other vernaculars to the inhabitants of Viking home communities during what has become known as the Viking Age. This period of Nordic military, mercantile and demographic expansion constitutes an important element in the early medieval history of Scandinavia, Estonia, the British Isles, France, Kievan Rus' and Sicily.
1_Apprentice
I live in the United States and it is very popular here, although I don't know much about it. Have you ever seen a game?
0_Wizard
I haven't, no. However, hockey played on grass is common in the United Kingdom and I was part of my secondary school team, competing against other school teams in my county. 
The United  Kingdom has given birth to a range of major international sports including: association football, rugby (union and league), cricket, netball, darts, golf, tennis, table tennis, badminton, squash, bowls, modern rowing, hockey, boxing, snooker, billiards, and curling.
self_Sport_in_the_United_Kingdom_0
Sport in the United Kingdom
self_1_Sport_in_the_United_Kingdom
Ice hockey
Ice hockey is a contact team sport played on ice, usually in a rink, in which two teams of skaters use their sticks to shoot a vulcanized rubber puck into their opponent's net to score points. The sport is known to be fast-paced and physical, with teams usually consisting of six players each: one goaltender, and five players who skate up and down the ice trying to take the puck and score a goal against the opposing team. Ice hockey is most popular in Canada, central and eastern Europe, Scandinavia, Russia and the United States. Ice hockey is the official national winter sport of Canada, and enjoys immense popularity; alongside Canada, ice hockey is the most popular winter sport in Belarus, Croatia, the Czech Republic, Finland, Latvia, Russia, Slovakia, Sweden, and Switzerland.
Ekiden
The term originated in Japan, although the concept of a long distance relay race is not unique to any country. The first "ekiden" race was sponsored by the Yomiuri Shimbun in 1917, and was run over three days between the old Japanese capital of Kyoto and the modern capital of Tokyo, a distance of 508 km, to celebrate the anniversary of the moving of the capital to Tokyo. As written in Japanese, "Ekiden" combines the characters for "station" (駅) and "transmit" (伝). This name was coined by the poet Toki Zemmaro (1885–1980), who was head of the Yomiuri Shimbun's Social Affairs Department at the time.
Sports in the United States
Sports in the United States are an important part of the country's culture. Based on revenue, the four major professional sports leagues in the United States are Major League Baseball (MLB), the National Basketball Association (NBA), the National Football League (NFL), and the National Hockey League (NHL). The market for professional sports in the United States is roughly $69 billion, roughly 50% larger than that of all of Europe, the Middle East, and Africa combined. Major League Soccer is sometimes included in a "top five" of leagues of the country. All four enjoy wide-ranging domestic media coverage and are considered the preeminent leagues in their respective sports in the world, although only basketball, baseball, and ice hockey have substantial followings in other nations.
Sport in the United Kingdom
The United  Kingdom has given birth to a range of major international sports including: association football, rugby (union and league), cricket, netball, darts, golf, tennis, table tennis, badminton, squash, bowls, modern rowing, hockey, boxing, snooker, billiards, and curling. This has meant that in the infancy of many sports, England, Scotland, Wales and Ireland formed among the earliest separate governing bodies, national teams and domestic league competitions. After 1922 some sports formed separate bodies for Northern Ireland though some continued to be organised on an all-Ireland basis. In a small number of sports, these teams are supplemented by high-profile events featuring a combined team representing one or more nations.
Roller in-line hockey
Roller in-line hockey is a team sport played on a wood, asphalt, cement or sport tile surface, in which players use a hockey stick to shoot a hard plastic hockey puck into their opponent's goal to score points. It is considered a contact sport but body checking is prohibited. However, there are exceptions to that with the NRHL which involves fighting. Inline hockey teams are composed of up to four lines of players including two forwards and two defensemen on each line. There are five players including the goalie from each team on the rink at a time. It is the goalie's job to prevent the other team's players from scoring.
Netball in New Zealand
Netball is the most popular women's sport in New Zealand, in terms of player participation and public interest. With the national team, the Silver Ferns, currently ranked second in the world, netball maintains a high profile in New Zealand. As in other netball-playing countries, netball is considered primarily a women's sport; men's and mixed teams exist at different levels, but are ancillary to women's competition. In 2008, 138,000 players were registered with Netball New Zealand, the governing body for organised netball in the country. Organised competition ranges from interschool and local club netball to premier domestic competitions such as the ANZ Championship, with the pinnacle for netball players in New Zealand being selection for the national team.
High school football
High school football is gridiron football played by high school teams in the United States and Canada. It ranks among the most popular interscholastic sports in both countries. It is also popular amongst American High school teams in Europe. High school football began in the late 19th century, concurrent with the start of many college football programs. In the late 19th and early 20th century, many college and high school teams played against one another. Other traditions of high school football such as pep rallies, marching bands, mascots, and homecomings are mirrored from college football. No true minor league farm organizations exist in American football.
1_Apprentice
Wow! That's interesting! Is hockey played on grass as much of a contact sport as hockey played on ice?
0_Wizard
Definitely not! It always amazes me how many fights ice hockey players seem to get in to. Hockey is non-contact over here, although I have seen the odd person get hit in the face with a stick where the other person has raised their stick too high! 
Ice hockey is a contact team sport played on ice, usually in a rink, in which two teams of skaters use their sticks to shoot a vulcanized rubber puck into their opponent's net to score points.
self_Ice_hockey_0
Ice hockey
self_0_Ice_hockey
Ice hockey
Ice hockey is a contact team sport played on ice, usually in a rink, in which two teams of skaters use their sticks to shoot a vulcanized rubber puck into their opponent's net to score points. The sport is known to be fast-paced and physical, with teams usually consisting of six players each: one goaltender, and five players who skate up and down the ice trying to take the puck and score a goal against the opposing team. Ice hockey is most popular in Canada, central and eastern Europe, Scandinavia, Russia and the United States. Ice hockey is the official national winter sport of Canada, and enjoys immense popularity; alongside Canada, ice hockey is the most popular winter sport in Belarus, Croatia, the Czech Republic, Finland, Latvia, Russia, Slovakia, Sweden, and Switzerland.
Field hockey stick
In field hockey, each player carries a stick and cannot take part in the game without it. The stick for an adult is usually in the range 89–95 cm (35–38 in) long. A maximum length of 105 cm (41") was stipulated from 2016. The maximum permitted weight is 737 grams.The majority of players use a stick in the range 19 oz to 22 oz (538 g - 623 g). Traditionally hockey sticks were made of hickory, ash or mulberry wood with the head of the sticks being hand carved and therefore required skilled craftsmen to produce. Sticks made of wood continue to be made but the higher grade sticks are now manufactured from composite materials which were first permitted after 1992.
Field hockey
Field hockey is a team sport of the hockey family. The earliest origins of the game date back to the Middle Ages in England, Scotland, France and the Netherlands. The game can be played on a grass field, turf field or synthetic field as well as an indoor board surface. Each team plays with eleven players, including the goalie. Players use sticks made out of wood, carbon fibre, fibre glass or a combination of carbon fibre and fibre glass in different quantities (with the higher carbon fibre stick being more expensive and less likely to break) to hit a round, hard, plastic ball. The length of the stick depends on the player's individual height.
Bobby Orr
Robert Gordon Orr, OC (born March 20, 1948) is a Canadian former professional ice hockey player, widely acknowledged as one of the greatest hockey players of all time. Orr used his ice skating speed, scoring, and play-making abilities to revolutionize the position of defenceman. He played in the National Hockey League (NHL) for 12 seasons, starting with 10 with the Boston Bruins followed by two with the Chicago Black Hawks. Orr remains the only defenceman to have won the league scoring title with two Art Ross Trophies. He holds the record for most points and assists in a single season by a defenceman.
Summit Series
The Summit Series, or Super Series (in Russian "Суперсерия СССР — Канада"; "Superseriya SSSR — Canada"), known at the time simply as the Canada–USSR Series, was an eight-game series of ice hockey between the Soviet Union and Canada, held in September 1972. It was the first competition between the Soviet national team and a Canadian team represented by professional players of the National Hockey League (NHL), known as "Team Canada". It was the first international ice hockey competition for Canada after Canada had withdrawn from international ice hockey competitions in a dispute with the International Ice Hockey Federation (IIHF).
Fighting in ice hockey
Fighting in ice hockey is an established tradition of the sport in North America, with a long history that involves many levels of amateur and professional play and includes some notable individual fights. Fighting is usually performed by enforcers, or "goons"—players whose role is to fight and intimidate—on a given team, and is governed by a complex system of unwritten rules that players, coaches, officials, and the media refer to as "the code". Some fights are spontaneous, while others are premeditated by the participants. While officials tolerate fighting during hockey games, they impose a variety of penalties on players who engage in fights.
Roller in-line hockey
Roller in-line hockey is a team sport played on a wood, asphalt, cement or sport tile surface, in which players use a hockey stick to shoot a hard plastic hockey puck into their opponent's goal to score points. It is considered a contact sport but body checking is prohibited. However, there are exceptions to that with the NRHL which involves fighting. Inline hockey teams are composed of up to four lines of players including two forwards and two defensemen on each line. There are five players including the goalie from each team on the rink at a time. It is the goalie's job to prevent the other team's players from scoring.
1_Apprentice
Ice hockey seems to be quite a violent sport, for sure. Field hockey sounds a little bit more my speed. What position did you play?
0_Wizard
Yeah, ice hockey would terrify me! I was always in defense, it's quite satisfying to assist in keeping the other team away from our goalie!
Each team plays with eleven players, including the goalie.
self_Field_hockey_3
Field hockey
self_2_Field_hockey
Ice hockey
Ice hockey is a contact team sport played on ice, usually in a rink, in which two teams of skaters use their sticks to shoot a vulcanized rubber puck into their opponent's net to score points. The sport is known to be fast-paced and physical, with teams usually consisting of six players each: one goaltender, and five players who skate up and down the ice trying to take the puck and score a goal against the opposing team. Ice hockey is most popular in Canada, central and eastern Europe, Scandinavia, Russia and the United States. Ice hockey is the official national winter sport of Canada, and enjoys immense popularity; alongside Canada, ice hockey is the most popular winter sport in Belarus, Croatia, the Czech Republic, Finland, Latvia, Russia, Slovakia, Sweden, and Switzerland.
Roller in-line hockey
Roller in-line hockey is a team sport played on a wood, asphalt, cement or sport tile surface, in which players use a hockey stick to shoot a hard plastic hockey puck into their opponent's goal to score points. It is considered a contact sport but body checking is prohibited. However, there are exceptions to that with the NRHL which involves fighting. Inline hockey teams are composed of up to four lines of players including two forwards and two defensemen on each line. There are five players including the goalie from each team on the rink at a time. It is the goalie's job to prevent the other team's players from scoring.
Ottawa Senators (original)
The Ottawa Senators were an ice hockey team based in Ottawa, Canada which existed from 1883 to 1954. The club was the first hockey club in Ontario, a founding member of the National Hockey League (NHL) and played in the NHL from 1917 until 1934. The club, which was officially the Ottawa Hockey Club (Ottawa HC), was known by several nicknames, including the "Generals" in the 1890s, the "Silver Seven" from 1903 to 1907 and the "Senators" dating from 1908. Generally acknowledged by hockey historians as one of the greatest teams of the early days of the sport, the club won numerous championships, starting with the 1891 to 1893 Ontario championships.
Maine Black Bears men's ice hockey
The Maine Black Bears men's ice hockey team is a National Collegiate Athletic Association (NCAA) Division I college ice hockey program that represents the University of Maine. The Black Bears are a member of Hockey East. They play at the Harold Alfond Sports Arena—commonly known as Alfond Arena or "The Alfond"—in Orono, Maine. The Black Bears have appeared in eleven Frozen Fours, have a 28–18 record in NCAA Tournament games, and have won two national championships—in 1993 and 1999. The University of Maine, then known as the University of Maine at Orono, officially developed an NCAA sanctioned men's ice hockey program in 1977.
Victorian Ice Hockey Association
The Victorian Ice Hockey Association, currently trading as Ice Hockey Victoria is the governing body of ice hockey in Victoria, Australia. The Victorian Ice Hockey Association is a branch of Ice Hockey Australia. 12 September 1908 is the date of the formation of the first ice hockey association in Australia. The meeting at the Melbourne Glaciarium occurred directly after an evening ice hockey game between the Brighton Ice Hockey Club and the Melburnians, which resulted in a 2-2 tie. The meeting was for the purpose of organising a club for the following season and the following committee was appointed: Lorimer, Ward, Errol F. Woods, W. Purbrick and Andrew Lambert Reid.
Underwater ice hockey
Underwater Ice Hockey (also called Sub-aqua Ice Hockey) is a minor extreme sport that is a variant of Ice Hockey. It is played upside-down underneath frozen pools or ponds. Participants wear diving masks, fins and wetsuits and use the underside of the frozen surface as the playing area for a floating puck. Competitors do not use any breathing apparatuses, but instead surface for air every 30 seconds or so. It is not to be confused with Underwater Hockey, in which the floor of a swimming pool and a sinking puck are used. The idea for the sport is attributed to Christian Redl, an Austrian freediver who is notable for various world free-diving depth records under ice.
Hockey
Hockey is a sport in which two teams play against each other by trying to maneuver a ball or a puck into the opponent's goal using a hockey stick. There are many types of hockey such as bandy, field hockey and ice hockey. Often one variation of the sport, such as field hockey or ice hockey, will predominate in a certain area and be known simply as "hockey". The first recorded use of the word "hockey" is in the 1773 book "Juvenile Sports and Pastimes, to Which Are Prefixed, Memoirs of the Author: Including a New Mode of Infant Education" by Richard Johnson (Pseud. Master Michel Angelo), whose chapter XI was titled "New Improvements on the Game of Hockey".
1_Apprentice
That sounds like it would be a lot of fun! I think I would like to be a goalie! How long is a hockey game? Is it broken down into quarters or halves?
0_Wizard
I honestly can't remember, it's been 12 years since I played it now! I would love to get back in to it but I don't know of any local teams unfortunately. It was split in to two halves, and we would swap goal sides in each half to make it fairer - similar to football. Do you know how long an ice hockey game is?
no_passages_used
no_passages_used
no_passages_used
no_passages_used
Summit Series
The Summit Series, or Super Series (in Russian "Суперсерия СССР — Канада"; "Superseriya SSSR — Canada"), known at the time simply as the Canada–USSR Series, was an eight-game series of ice hockey between the Soviet Union and Canada, held in September 1972. It was the first competition between the Soviet national team and a Canadian team represented by professional players of the National Hockey League (NHL), known as "Team Canada". It was the first international ice hockey competition for Canada after Canada had withdrawn from international ice hockey competitions in a dispute with the International Ice Hockey Federation (IIHF).
List of Madagascar (franchise) characters
This is a list of characters that have appeared in the "Madagascar" films, the television series "The Penguins of Madagascar", and the Netflix series "All Hail King Julien". Tom McGrath explained in an interview that the intention of "Madagascar" was not to take a political stance on whether "zoos are bad and the wild is better, or that the wild is bad," but to show "the most extreme 'fish out of water' story that [they] could do". McGrath stated "the basic irony to the story is that, you think animals do belong in the wild, but if they're so accustomed to civility, they wouldn't know where food even came from," and the animals were meant to "love the zoo and to love where they are because they've got" "right off Fifth Avenue".
Ice hockey
Ice hockey is a contact team sport played on ice, usually in a rink, in which two teams of skaters use their sticks to shoot a vulcanized rubber puck into their opponent's net to score points. The sport is known to be fast-paced and physical, with teams usually consisting of six players each: one goaltender, and five players who skate up and down the ice trying to take the puck and score a goal against the opposing team. Ice hockey is most popular in Canada, central and eastern Europe, Scandinavia, Russia and the United States. Ice hockey is the official national winter sport of Canada, and enjoys immense popularity; alongside Canada, ice hockey is the most popular winter sport in Belarus, Croatia, the Czech Republic, Finland, Latvia, Russia, Slovakia, Sweden, and Switzerland.
Bandy
Bandy is a team winter sport played on ice, in which skaters use sticks to direct a ball into the opposing team's goal. Based on the number of participating athletes, bandy is the world's second most popular winter sport after ice hockey. Bandy is also the number two winter sport in tickets sold per day of competitions at the sport's world championship compared to the other winter sports. The sport is considered a form of hockey and has a common background with association football, ice hockey and field hockey. Like football, the game is normally played in halves of 45 minutes each, there are eleven players on each team, and the bandy field is about the same size as a football pitch.
Field hockey
Field hockey is a team sport of the hockey family. The earliest origins of the game date back to the Middle Ages in England, Scotland, France and the Netherlands. The game can be played on a grass field, turf field or synthetic field as well as an indoor board surface. Each team plays with eleven players, including the goalie. Players use sticks made out of wood, carbon fibre, fibre glass or a combination of carbon fibre and fibre glass in different quantities (with the higher carbon fibre stick being more expensive and less likely to break) to hit a round, hard, plastic ball. The length of the stick depends on the player's individual height.
Ottawa Senators (original)
The Ottawa Senators were an ice hockey team based in Ottawa, Canada which existed from 1883 to 1954. The club was the first hockey club in Ontario, a founding member of the National Hockey League (NHL) and played in the NHL from 1917 until 1934. The club, which was officially the Ottawa Hockey Club (Ottawa HC), was known by several nicknames, including the "Generals" in the 1890s, the "Silver Seven" from 1903 to 1907 and the "Senators" dating from 1908. Generally acknowledged by hockey historians as one of the greatest teams of the early days of the sport, the club won numerous championships, starting with the 1891 to 1893 Ontario championships.
Canadian women's ice hockey history
The first instances of organized women's ice hockey in Canada date back to the 1890s when it is played at the university level. The Women's Hockey Association claims that the city of Ottawa, Ontario hosted the first game in 1891. In 1920, Lady Meredith, wife of Sir Vincent Meredith of Montreal donated the Lady Meredith Cup for the Quebec Ladies' Hockey Association, said to be the first women's ice hockey trophy to be competed for in Canada. In February 1921 a women's international championship series was played in conjunction with the Pacific Coast Hockey Association. One of the first professional teams were the Vancouver Amazons from the 1920s.
1_Apprentice
In the NHL, the National Hockey League in the United States, each game is three periods long with each period lasting 20 minutes.  There is an intermission after the first and second periods, but 60 minutes of playing time. 
0_Wizard
That's fascinating! I understand that there are more North American teams in the NHL than Canadian. Do the Canadians have thier own league?
The National Hockey League (NHL; ) is a professional ice hockey league in North America, currently comprising 31 teams: 24 in the United States and 7 in Canada.
partner_National_Hockey_League_0
National Hockey League
partner_0_National_Hockey_League
Ice hockey at the Olympic Games
Ice hockey tournaments have been staged at the Olympic Games since 1920. The men's tournament was introduced at the 1920 Summer Olympics and was transferred permanently to the Winter Olympic Games program in 1924, in France. The women's tournament was first held at the 1998 Winter Olympics. The Olympic Games were originally intended for amateur athletes. However, the advent of the state-sponsored "full-time amateur athlete" of the Eastern Bloc countries further eroded the ideology of the pure amateur, as it put the self-financed amateurs of the Western countries at a disadvantage. The Soviet Union entered teams of athletes who were all nominally students, soldiers, or working in a profession, but many of whom were in reality paid by the state to train on a full-time basis.
Major professional sports leagues in the United States and Canada
The major professional sports leagues in the United States and Canada are the highest professional competitions of team sports in those countries. The four leagues universally included in the definition are Major League Baseball (MLB), the National Basketball Association (NBA), the National Football League (NFL), and the National Hockey League (NHL). Other prominent leagues include Major League Soccer (MLS) and the Canadian Football League (CFL). The MLB, NBA, NFL and NHL are commonly referred to as the "Big 4". Each of these is the wealthiest professional club competition in its sport worldwide, and along with the English Premier League they make up the top five sports leagues by revenue in the world.
NHL–WHA merger
The 1979 merger of the NHL and WHA was the culmination of several years of negotiations between the National Hockey League (NHL) and the World Hockey Association (WHA) that resulted in the WHA and all of its surviving franchises folding in return for the owners of four of the WHA's six surviving teams (the Edmonton Oilers, New England Whalers, Quebec Nordiques, and Winnipeg Jets) being granted expansion franchises that commenced play in the NHL for the 1979–80 season. The agreement officially took effect on June 22, 1979. The merger ended the seven-year existence of the WHA and re-established the NHL as the lone major league in North American professional ice hockey.
Summit Series
The Summit Series, or Super Series (in Russian "Суперсерия СССР — Канада"; "Superseriya SSSR — Canada"), known at the time simply as the Canada–USSR Series, was an eight-game series of ice hockey between the Soviet Union and Canada, held in September 1972. It was the first competition between the Soviet national team and a Canadian team represented by professional players of the National Hockey League (NHL), known as "Team Canada". It was the first international ice hockey competition for Canada after Canada had withdrawn from international ice hockey competitions in a dispute with the International Ice Hockey Federation (IIHF).
History of Canadian sports
The History of Canadian sports falls into five stages of development: early recreational activities before 1840; the start of organized competition, 1840-1880; the emergence of national organizations, 1882-1914; the rapid growth of both amateur and professional sports, 1914 to 1960; and developments of the last half-century. Some sports, especially hockey, lacrosse and curling enjoy an international reputation as particularly Canadian. Canadian sports attract large numbers of participants and huge audiences; hockey, played by 1.4 million Canadians, has become part of the national identity. Team sports often involved informal gambling.
Hockey Night in Canada
Hockey Night in Canada (often abbreviated Hockey Night or HNIC) is a branding used for Canadian television presentations of the National Hockey League. While the name has been used for all NHL broadcasts on CBC Television (regardless of the time of day), "Hockey Night in Canada" is primarily associated with its Saturday night NHL broadcasts, a practice originating from Saturday NHL broadcasts that began in 1931 on the CNR Radio network and continued on its successors, and debuting on television beginning in 1952. Initially only airing a single game weekly, the modern incarnation airs a weekly double-header, with game times normally at 7:00 and 10:00 p.m. (ET).
Wayne Gretzky
Wayne Douglas Gretzky (; born January 26, 1961) is a Canadian former professional ice hockey player and former head coach. He played twenty seasons in the National Hockey League (NHL) for four teams from 1979 to 1999. Nicknamed "The Great One", he has been called "the greatest hockey player ever" by many sportswriters, players, and the league itself. Gretzky is the leading scorer in NHL history, with more goals and assists than any other player. He garnered more assists than any other player scored total points, and is the only NHL player to total over 200 points in one season – a feat he accomplished four times.