Up in Ontario

Playing Defense at the Rink

I drove to play hockey tonight with my rec-league team and realized as I passed along the dark highway that I have played for 24 years, I have skated for 27 years and I am not yet ready to not play any more. My body sometimes aches the morning after playing and my forearms and wrists show bruises and cuts when I wear short-sleeved shirts, but I still love to play.

We played tonight and beat the top team in our division. This feat may sound innocuous, trite, inconsequential, maybe a little precious, and to watch us play may provide the same experience to the casual observer, but when we return to the dressing room after playing and we know we have surpassed the level that we had previously contented ourselves with and we had learned new ways to make the rhythms, speed, and yes, violence, of the game work to our favour, there are few better feelings in sport.

In the opposition's dressing room the sounds of complaints would have been heard. I know, I have been there. As a French teacher of mine used to say, "les pleures et les grincements des dents." And I know I will be there again. But tonight, we won: 5-4. The team I play on has a name that sounds more to me like a Quebecois biker gang (Vipers) but it's a good group of guys who play hard for each other, and that is the most important thing.

Hockey to me is an incredible blend of rhythmic beauty and flurries of violence scrambled together in a limited playing space and sped up as fast as possible. As a player, progression through the levels of the game remains determined by your ability to adjust to the increased speed and violence. Largely, the patterns remain the same. The higher the level at which you play, the more magnified each small detail becomes - the way you hold your stick, how you move in the corners, your ability to react to the play and see the opening as it begins to develop, your ability to position your body to shoot from awkward angles, your ability to understand the stages of the game and your opportunism and resilience with pressure. These are the key elements of the game.

I play defense and I like playing defense. I may be the only one on our team, or on any of the teams I've played on since I quit playing competitively who likes to play defense. Everyone wants to score the highlight reel goals, no one wants to sprint back to retrieve the dumped-in puck. But to me, defense is where the game still lives. I can watch plays develop, see the openings and pick and choose my spots to rush or pinch. Tonight we played the whole game with 3 defensemen (which is 1 short from a minimum number that will allow for one full shift of players so eveyone can rest) and we played one of our best defensive games of the season.

Which brings me to the other thing I really like about hockey: on any night one team can beat another. Talent, while important, does not guarantee a win. Over and over, teams that play together, teams that play systems, teams that are opportunistic when presented with opportunity and resilient when at a disadvantage are the ones that win. These may all sound like clichés, tired phrases worn out by post-game interviews and coaches filling air time with sound bites without revealing their thoughts, but they are nonetheless true. They endure because every season of every team exemplifies them. Don't lose a third period. The 5-foot rule around each blueline (at your own blueline get it out or keep it out, at the offensive blueline get it in or keep it in). Special teams and goaltending win close games. Shoot early and often. Win the battle along the boards. Be first to the puck.

So while much cry and hullabaloo (speaking of les pleures et les grincements des dents) has filled the pages of newspapers and the airwaves of sports talk radio recently about the state of hockey at the professional level, it will pass and shift to another topic soon enough. Rule changes have been suggested by everyone with a soapbox to shout from, and some will be installed with various degrees of success. But I have heard very little to convince me that the proposed changes will make much difference in the game.

As a counterpoint, I think the current game is played at an astonishingly high level, a level so high that a basement-dwelling team in today's NHL could compete with the greatest teams of the 50s and 60s, the Flying Frenchmen and the last Leafs team to win the cup. Players are bigger, better and faster. The key elements of the game - speed, smarts and violence - consistently are practiced at the highest level they have ever been practiced at in regular league play, even by the Minnesota Wild. So why not just call the game by the rule book and see what happens? If you want to get radical, take out the red line and institute no-touch icing. Don't commodify goals and aspire to professional lacrosse scores: 15-9.