Ice hockey is the National Game of Canada. The history of Ice hockey takes you back to centuries and it is said there a lot of evidence found to prove that hockey was played in Eastern Canada. But, during those times it had a different name called “Tooadijik”. It is also said that this game was played with the help of hurleys known as Wolchamaadijik.

As a lot of European migrants came into Canada, they introduced their chronicle to the game. For instance, the Irish brought in the sport of Hurling, the English introduced field hockey and the Scotts mooted in Shinty. Certain parts of these various games slowly got adapted to the cold conditions of Canada. The paintings show that, a game of hockey was played during those days, but without any rules called “Shinney”.

Gradually, as years passed by, hockey went through a lot of changes. It was in 1870 that the first set of rules was laid for Ice hockey, till then the game was played without any standard rules. The rules were laid by the students of the Montreal McGill University. As per the rules, each team was said to have about nine players and they use to play with a wood puck instead of a ball. The game was played for sixty minutes.

Modern hockey was created in Windsor, Canada and was called as “Colonel Hockey’s Game”. In the year 1943 it was declared that birth place of hockey was Kingston by the Canadian Amateur Hockey Association. The first game of modern hockey was played between Royal Military College and Queens University in the year 1886.

The first Ice hockey club was the “McGill University Hockey Club” which was formed in the year 1877, and the next one was the “Montreal Victorias” established in 1881. As the game started gaining more popularity, the first championship was held at Montreal’s winter carnival in the year 1883. During this championship McGill’s team victoriously took home the Carnival cup. The teams who won the championship joined the AHAC that is the Amateur Hockey Association of Canada to fight challenges every year.

After the first championship, some more changes were introduced to the game. The number of players were cut down to seven instead of nine and the time was divided into two thirty five minute halves. Totally the time was increased to seventy minutes as against sixty minutes.

Ice hockey became a profession only in the 1900’s. In the year 1910, National Hockey Association was established in Montreal. It was NHA(National Hockey Association)which further smoothened the rules of the game and brought in the system of penalties. Over a period of time, due to the dispute among the Canadian teams of the NHA, the National Hockey League was formed in the year 1917. Since then NHL who is the governing body of hockey. It stands as one of the top four sports organisations of the United States with its base in New York. It has some of the world’s best hockey players in its wings.