Three Key Hockey Rules To Know

With the Stanley Cup Finals all over television, you may have been tuning in to watch some of the games, but if you do not watch hockey regularly, you might be confused by some of the things that happen in the game; after all – as is the case with any sport – hockey does not make a whole lot of sense unless you know the basic rules!

When you watch hockey, you should think of it as soccer on ice, as this will give you a better feel for the manner in which the game is played; even with this approach to understanding hockey, however, there are still a few specific rules you will need to make sure you know.

Offsides: “Offsides” is a term you are probably used to from football and soccer, but the rules for offsides in hockey are a bit different; the hockey rink is divided into three zones, the attacking zone, the neutral zone, and the defending zone, with the two blue lines on the ice denoting where each one starts and stops – and with this information in your pocket, it is easy to understand offsides, as offsides occurs when a player crosses into the attacking zone before the puck!

Icing: Like offsides, icing deals with the lines on the ice, but icing deals with the puck being sent too far along the ice at once; if a player is on the other side of the center red line, and they send the puck all the way past the red line at the far end of the ice, they will be called for icing as soon as a defending player touches the puck, and a faceoff will occur.

Penalties: When a hockey player is called for a penalty, they will be sent off the ice completely for two minutes, and that player cannot be replaced; this creates a “Power Play” for the opposing team, where they are playing with more players on the ice than the other team for two minutes, and will be constantly on the attack during that time.

There are still plenty of nuances to the game of hockey, of course, but by understanding these three primary rules of hockey, you will be in much better shape for understanding the game as a whole!