NHL – The Second Season

May 14, 2014

NHL playoff hockey is probably the most intense and physically demanding team sport in the world. No other sport can claim the speed, power, agility, and endurance needed to play in a playoff atmosphere. You can watch the whole season and not notice what you see in the playoffs. Every check into the boards, power play, and shot on goal gets contested with a higher ferocity than the regular season displays. The teams skate all year to get into the brutal playoff tournament in which 16 games must be won to hoist the championship cup.

Many surveys and studies have been done to determine which team sport is the toughest, and many of the results are the same: hockey. Many of you would say football, but that strength and toughness are usually displayed as brute force. In hockey, speed and power must also utilize creativity and skill. Take, for instance, those players and defenders maneuvering a puck around the goal many times; it appears like a bunch of guys flailing away with sticks and elbows. The strength and powerful legs and core needed to fend off players while guiding a puck is a unique skill set. Of course, being on ice skates make the whole operation appear much more complicated and faster.

The playoff tournament in the NHL brings out the emotional level to a fever pitch as well. Remember, hockey is the only sport where you can elbow someone in the face and only need to sit in a penalty box for a few minutes. Even though teams try to avoid fights, physicality and toughness are part of the game where one side tries enforcing its will. The beatings taken are what separate it from the other team sports. Not one player escapes without getting poked, jabbed, tripped, punched, at least once in a match.

The fate of the Stanley Cup winner rides on the fortunes of their goalie. It has been said that the goalies are among the finest athletes on their teams. Speed, agility, and flexibility are the prime sources of their success. Their hand-eye coordination must be extraordinary to endure the rush in the playoffs. The scrums that evolve in front of the goal are like a mob riot, and the goalie must absorb all the strategy and puck movement through the chaos to give himself a superior position to the shooter.

When a winner is crowned in the NHL, they have endured a multitude of obstacles and trials. The regular season is already long, when preseason starts in September, and the Lord Stanley Cup is awarded in June. Your body is worn down; you're mentally exhausted, and you are sporting injuries needing to heel. The satisfaction comes with the battle which has been won with your team and coaches. After the final game, the teams shake hands because they know what it takes to withstand this type of sport, the game they love.