Ice hockey in the United States
| Ice hockey in the United States | |
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| Country | United States |
| Governing body | USA Hockey |
| National team |
Men's national team Women's national team |
| First played | 1893 |
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National competitions
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Club competitions
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International competitions
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Ice hockey, usually referred to in the U.S. simply as "hockey", is a popular sport in the United States. In the U.S. the game is most popular in regions of the country with a cold winter climate, namely the northeast and the upper Midwest. However, since the 1990s, hockey has become increasingly popular in the Sun Belt due in large part to the expansion of the National Hockey League to the southeast and southwest U.S., coupled with the mass relocation of many residents from northern cities with strong hockey support to these Sun Belt locations.
The contemporary sport of ice hockey was developed in Canada, most notably in Montreal, where the first indoor hockey game was played on March 3, 1875. Some characteristics of that game, such as the length of the ice rink and the use of a puck, have been retained to this day. The game soon spread to United States. It was brought overseas from Canadian immigrants. They would play this stick and ball game on frozen ponds and lakes in the winters. The first known recorded game of ice hockey was played in the United States at Yale University and Johns Hopkins University in 1893.
In 1894, the first artificial ice rink was built in Maryland. The rink was called the North Avenue Ice Palace, which was located in Baltimore, Maryland. A few years later, in 1896, the first ice hockey league in the United States was formed called The U.S. Amateur Hockey League. It was founded in New York City around the same time as the second artificial ice rink was opened in New York, New York, called the St. Nicholas Arena. The U.S. Amateur Hockey League then became a member of the International Ice Hockey Federation in 1904. There were five teams from the United States and Ontario that formed the International Ice Hockey Federation. This league only lasted three seasons but it was the first professional ice hockey league that the United States participated in.
Meanwhile, teams in western Canada formed the Pacific Coast Hockey Association in 1911. This league created new designs and rules that helped ice hockey evolve into the game it is today. Some of these new innovations that were created were blue lines that were painted under the ice which divided the ice into three sections, goaltenders are allowed to fall and slide on the ice to help prevent the other team from scoring a goal, forward passing is permitted in the neutral zone, and the game was split into three periods of 20 minutes. In 1912, the game changed again reducing the number of on-ice players to six players from the previous seven.
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