How to watch ice hockey

THAT'S HOCKEY: A player gets walloped in a hockey match.

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Few Kiwis know much about ice hockey. Will Harvie explains what to watch for at the Winter Olympics.

The skill of watching ice hockey on television is knowing where the puck is probably going, not focusing on where it is at any given moment.

For example, there are times in every hockey game when the puck skitters into a corner or behind the net and players on opposing teams converge to dispute possession. Offensive players want to pass the puck to a team-mate so he can take a shot on goal; defensive players want to get the puck out of the danger area.

What's really going on, however, is the heart of hockey: high-speed body checks, grinding, shoving matches, thrown elbows, smashing fists and perhaps a little dirty work with the hockey stick. If an opposing player is intimidated or injured, that's hockey.

Out of the melee, one team will emerge with possession of the puck. An offensive player will probably centre it to a team-mate lurking a few metres in front of the goal, ready for a fast-reflex shot on goal. Alternatively, the offensive player in the corner will make a long pass to the blue line, where another team- mate will be ready to take a slapshot on goal.

Top players at the Olympic level - that is, millionaires playing in North America's National Hockey League (NHL) - can muster slapshots of 150kmh. Rational people get out of the way of frozen-hard rubber discs travelling that fast, but hockey players jump in front of them.

Defensive players are trying to block slapshots, hopefully with their body armour and not with their helmets. But if a slapshot finds a chink in the padding and breaks a bone, that's hockey.

Offensive players don't want to block a slapshot, of course. They're trying to screen the goalie, preventing him from seeing the puck as it screams inwards. If they can, offensive players use their stick to deflect the puck, so it does something unpredictable and flummoxes the goalie.

As well as preventing goals, goalies must control rebounds. The most important players on the ice want to smother the puck and get a whistle, or steer the puck safely to a team-mate.

When the team on defence gets possession, it switches to offence and breaks out. Breakouts are often foot faces, with 10 players sprinting the length of the ice. Good skaters zigzag down the ice and this is where grace comes into the game.

The team now on offence is usually trying to create overlaps - two players against one or three against two. Try to identify the open player before he gets the puck. If the passing is pin-point, he'll get a shot on goal, sometimes a slapshot.

If the attack is broken up or the goalie controls a rebound, the puck will often skitter into a corner for more heart-of-hockey grinding and shoving. Watch for the player arriving late. He'll come fast and have lined up an opposing player for a beaut body check against the boards. Injuries often occur at this moment, and that's hockey.

Technically, only a player with the puck can be body-checked, but anyone in vicinity of the puck can be walloped. Body checkers are supposed to use their shoulders and hips, but players at this level know how to add elbows, knees and sticks without getting caught. Blindside hits are more or less allowed, but not hits above the shoulders. Sadly, fighting is strictly banned at the Olympics (whereas it's winked at in the NHL).

This Olympic tournament features pool play, in which the minnows (Switzerland, Belarus, Latvia) will be minced. The top eight teams advance to the playoffs, which follow a knock-out format. To win gold, a team must win at least three successive playoff games. Canada is the favourite, but the Russians, Finns, Swedes, Czechs and Americans have realistic chances.

There's also a women's tournament, which Canada is favoured to win. It starts on Sunday. The men's tournament starts on February 16.

Kiwis might as well support the Canadians because, um, they're Commonwealth cousins.

Will Harvie is Canadian.

- © Fairfax NZ News