A hockey stick is a piece of sports equipment used by the players in all the forms of
hockey
Hockey is a term used to denote a family of various types of both summer and winter team sports which originated on either an outdoor field, sheet of ice, or dry floor such as in a gymnasium. While these sports vary in specific rules, numbers o ...
to move the ball or puck (as appropriate to the type of hockey) either to push, pull, hit, strike, flick, steer, launch or stop the ball/
puck during play with the objective being to move the ball/puck around the playing area using the stick, and then trying to score.
The word "stick" is a very generic term for the equipment since the different disciplines of hockey require significant differences in both the form and the size of the stick used for it to be effective in the different sports. Field/ice/roller hockey all have a visually similar form of stick with a long shaft or handle which can be held with two hands, and a curved and flattened end; the end and curvature of these sticks are generally the most visible differences between the sticks for these sports. A modern underwater hockey stick bears little resemblance to any field/ice/roller hockey stick, since it is much smaller to enable it to be used exclusively in one hand, and it also has to be produced in one of two colours in order to identify which of the competing teams a player is playing for.
Field hockey
Field hockey
Field hockey is a team sport structured in standard hockey format, in which each team plays with ten outfield players and a goalkeeper. Teams must drive a round hockey ball by hitting it with a hockey stick towards the rival team's shooting ci ...
sticks have an end that varies in shape, often depending on the player's position. In general, there are four main variations on the head:
![Alter holzhockeyschlaeger](https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/8/8b/Alter_holzhockeyschlaeger.jpg)
The 'short' is mainly used by players wishing control over the ball, and increase their manoeuvrability. This specific head is most associated with the mid-field position. (or centre for Ice Hockey)
The 'Midi' is used by players who will be hitting the ball often and need to be strong on their 'reverse side'. This specific head is most associated with the striker or 'up-front' position.
The 'Maxi' is similar to the 'Midi' as it has an increased surface area which is useful for hitting. However, its strength allows it to be used much more effectively for stopping the ball. This head is used by 'defenders' and 'attackers'.
The 'J Hook' again has a large surface area. However does not have the effectiveness of the 'Midi' for striking the ball, it has an increased thickness making it ideal for stopping the ball. This head is most commonly used by 'defenders'.
Field hockey sticks vary widely in length and price, ranging from 26" to 38.5". The main brands of sticks include TK,
Grays,
Slazenger
Slazenger () is a British sports equipment brand owned by the Frasers Group (formerly Sports Direct). The company was established as a sporting goods shop in 1881 by Ralph and Albert Slazenger on London's Cannon Street.J. R. Lowerson, 'Slazenge ...
, Byte,
Kookaburra
Kookaburras are terrestrial tree kingfishers of the genus ''Dacelo'' native to Australia and New Guinea, which grow to between in length and weigh around . The name is a loanword from Wiradjuri ''guuguubarra'', onomatopoeic of its call. The ...
, Malik, Dita, Voodoo,
Adidas
Adidas AG (; stylized as adidas since 1949) is a German multinational corporation, founded and headquartered in Herzogenaurach, Bavaria, that designs and manufactures shoes, clothing and accessories. It is the largest sportswear manufactur ...
, Gryphon, uber hockey, Woodworm, Brabo, Mercian, Mazon, Zoppo, Tempest, Matador, King Karachi, NedStar, The Indian Maharaja, Stag, Wasa, No Fear, BHP, Taurus, Wasp, Princess, IHSAN, Mohinder, Chryso, Piranha, Rage, Sachin and Edge.
The size of the stick that is most effective for a specific player is judged by that player's height. A 28" stick would be used by a player under 4' most commonly, whereas a 38" stick would be used mainly by players over 5'10". However 'defenders' often like to have a longer stick than 'attackers' as this can be used for a greater reach when stopping a moving ball. The 'attackers' prefer a shorter stick as it allows greater control of the ball.
Ice hockey
Ice hockey
Ice hockey (or simply hockey) is a team sport played on ice skates, usually on an ice skating rink with lines and markings specific to the sport. It belongs to a family of sports called hockey. In ice hockey, two opposing teams use ice hock ...
sticks have traditionally been made from wood, but in recent years, sticks made of more expensive materials such as
aluminum
Aluminium (aluminum in American and Canadian English) is a chemical element with the symbol Al and atomic number 13. Aluminium has a density lower than those of other common metals, at approximately one third that of steel. It has ...
,
aramid
Aramid fibers, short for aromatic polyamide, are a class of heat-resistant and strong synthetic fibers. They are used in aerospace and military applications, for ballistic-rated body armor fabric and ballistic composites, in marine cordage, ma ...
(brands Kevlar, Nomex, Twaron, etc.),
fibreglass
Fiberglass (American English) or fibreglass (Commonwealth English) is a common type of fiber-reinforced plastic using glass fiber. The fibers may be randomly arranged, flattened into a sheet called a chopped strand mat, or woven into glass clo ...
,
carbon fibre
Carbon fiber-reinforced polymers (American English), carbon-fibre-reinforced polymers (Commonwealth English), carbon-fiber-reinforced plastics, carbon-fiber reinforced-thermoplastic (CFRP, CRP, CFRTP), also known as carbon fiber, carbon compo ...
, and other
composite material
A composite material (also called a composition material or shortened to composite, which is the common name) is a material which is produced from two or more constituent materials. These constituent materials have notably dissimilar chemical or ...
s have become common. In addition to weighing less, composite sticks can be manufactured with more consistent flexibility properties than their wooden counterparts. They also do not have the natural variations that wooden sticks possess therefore a batch of the same sticks will all perform roughly the same. There were a few die-hard NHL professionals who still liked the feel of wood sticks as late as 2010, such as
Paul Stastny
Paul Stastny (born December 27, 1985) is a Canadian-born American professional ice hockey center for the Carolina Hurricanes of the National Hockey League (NHL). He has previously played for the Colorado Avalanche, St. Louis Blues, Winnipeg Jets ...
, son of Hall-of-Famer
Peter Šťastný
Peter Šťastný (; born 18 September 1956), also known colloquially as "Peter the Great" and "Stosh", is a Slovak-Canadian former professional ice hockey player who played in the National Hockey League (NHL) from 1980 to 1995. Šťastný is the ...
. Some of these sticks have replaceable wood or composite blades, while others are one-piece sticks without a replaceable blade. Composite sticks, despite their greater expense, are now commonplace at nearly all competitive levels of the sport, including youth ice hockey. Some of the top brands of composite sticks include Bauer, Easton, Reebok/CCM, and Warrior. These new sticks are lighter and provide a quicker release of the puck, resulting in a harder, more accurate shot. Although the new materials do enable harder shots, the improved durability and lighter materials can make the transition from wooden to composite stick more difficult for less experienced players. A shortcut used by numerous players is to use a weighted system, such as kwik hands, to quickly adjust to the new sticks. More expensive ice hockey sticks (such as the Bauer Vapor 1X, Bauer Supreme 1S, Bauer Nexus 1N, CCM Ribcor Trigger PMT2, CCM RBZ FT1, CCM Super Tacks 2.0, Easton Stealth CX, Easton Synergy GX, Warrior Covert QRL, Warrior Alpha QX, Warrior Dynasty HD1) usually are the lightest sticks on the market (390-470 grams in a senior stick). In addition to the increased torque that these composite sticks possess, the sticks do not warp or absorb moisture like their wooden counterparts.
When the player is standing on his skates with the stick upright, on the toe, perpendicular to the ice, the top of the shaft should stop just below or above the chin, depending on personal preference. Defensemen tend to use longer sticks which provide greater reach when poke-checking.
Ice hockey sticks are also used in
rinkball
Rinkball is a winter team sport played on ice with ice skates and is most popular in Finland, where it is known as ''kaukalopallo''. This ball sport originated in Sweden in the 1960s and from there landed in Finland in the 1970s.
The objective ...
.
Inline hockey
In the event of roller inline hockey, one-piece sticks are usually the same as ice hockey sticks. But when graphite shafts are used with replacement blades, it's quite common for the replacement blades to be made of mainly fibreglass with a narrow wood core. Fibreglass shaves down over time on concrete, sport court and blacktop surfaces where traditional wooden ice hockey replacement blades are more likely to splinter, split and/or crack on those surfaces.
Underwater hockey
![UWH Stick dimensions](https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/6/68/UWH_Stick_dimensions.png)
The stick (also referred to as a pusher) for
underwater hockey
Underwater hockey (UWH), (also known as Octopush in the United Kingdom) is a globally played limited-contact sport in which two teams compete to manoeuvre a puck across the bottom of a swimming pool into the opposing team's goal by propelling ...
is relatively short compared to that for field/ice/roller hockey, and should be coloured either white or black in its entirety to indicate the player's team. The shape of the stick can affect playing style and is often a very personal choice.
A wide variety of stick designs are allowed within the constraints of the rules of the game, the principal rule being that the stick must fit into a box of 100 x 50 x 350mm (approximately 4" x 2" x 14") and that the stick must not be capable of surrounding the
puck by any more than 50% of the puck's circumference, nor any part of the hand. A rule concerning the radiuses of projections and edges tries to address the risk that the stick might unintentionally become more of a weapon than a playing tool.
Construction materials may be of wood or plastics and current rules now supersede those that previously required sticks to be
homogeneous
Homogeneity and heterogeneity are concepts often used in the sciences and statistics relating to the uniformity of a substance or organism. A material or image that is homogeneous is uniform in composition or character (i.e. color, shape, siz ...
, although they almost always are anyway. Many players of
UWH manufacture their own sticks of wood to their preferred shape and style, although there are increasingly more mass-produced designs that suit the majority (such as Bentfish, Britbat, CanAm, Dorsal, Stingray etc.) which in most cases are made of a moulded
nylon
Nylon is a generic designation for a family of synthetic polymers composed of polyamides ( repeating units linked by amide links).The polyamides may be aliphatic or semi-aromatic.
Nylon is a silk-like thermoplastic, generally made from petro ...
or
PTFE
Polytetrafluoroethylene (PTFE) is a synthetic fluoropolymer of tetrafluoroethylene that has numerous applications. It is one of the best-known and widely applied PFAS. The commonly known brand name of PTFE-based composition is Teflon by Chemour ...
, and many styles can be obtained to suit either
handedness
In human biology, handedness is an individual's preferential use of one hand, known as the dominant hand, due to it being stronger, faster or more Fine motor skill, dextrous. The other hand, comparatively often the weaker, less dextrous or sim ...
.
The rules allow for a symmetrical double-ended stick to be used, i.e. one that may be held in either the left or the right hand, and this can give
ambidextrous
Ambidexterity is the ability to use both the right and left hand equally well. When referring to objects, the term indicates that the object is equally suitable for right-handed and left-handed people. When referring to humans, it indicates that ...
players the opportunity to swap hands during play, although the rules are also very clear that the stick may be held in only one hand at a time.
Modern-day
Underwater Hockey
Underwater hockey (UWH), (also known as Octopush in the United Kingdom) is a globally played limited-contact sport in which two teams compete to manoeuvre a puck across the bottom of a swimming pool into the opposing team's goal by propelling ...
(UWH) was invented as a sport originally known as
Octopush
Underwater hockey (UWH), (also known as Octopush in the United Kingdom) is a globally played limited-contact sport in which two teams compete to manoeuvre a puck across the bottom of a swimming pool into the opposing team's goal by propelling ...
in
Southsea
Southsea is a seaside resort and a geographic area of Portsmouth, Portsea Island in England. Southsea is located 1.8 miles (2.8 km) to the south of Portsmouth's inner city-centre. Southsea is not a separate town as all of Portsea Island's s ...
,
England
England is a country that is part of the United Kingdom. It shares land borders with Wales to its west and Scotland to its north. The Irish Sea lies northwest and the Celtic Sea to the southwest. It is separated from continental Europe b ...
in 1954 and has always used short sticks or pushers similar to those described above, but a very similar game also called underwater hockey evolved some years after this in
South Africa
South Africa, officially the Republic of South Africa (RSA), is the southernmost country in Africa. It is bounded to the south by of coastline that stretch along the South Atlantic and Indian Oceans; to the north by the neighbouring countri ...
. This game used a 'long stick' that had a very similar form to an ice hockey stick, although it was considerably smaller at around 50cm (20") long and required two hands to hold and use it. The 'long stick' version of the game that was played largely in the
southern hemisphere eventually gave way to the more widely played 'short stick' version and since about 1980, the year of the first UWH World Championship, the original 'short stick' game has been played universally around the world.
Other uses of the term
In the
cha-cha and
rhumba
Rhumba, also known as ballroom rumba, is a genre of ballroom music and dance that appeared in the East Coast of the United States during the 1930s. It combined American big band music with Afro-Cuban rhythms, primarily the son cubano, but also co ...
dancing, the "hockey stick" is a figure in which the dancer moves along a straight line, with an angled turn at the end.
List of Cha Cha Cha moves
/ref>
On aircraft liveries, a Hockey Stick
A hockey stick is a piece of sports equipment used by the players in all the forms of hockey to move the ball or puck (as appropriate to the type of hockey) either to push, pull, hit, strike, flick, steer, launch or stop the ball/ puck during pla ...
is a cheatline
An aircraft livery is a set of comprehensive insignia comprising color, graphic, and typographical identifiers which operators (airlines, governments, air forces and occasionally private and corporate owners) apply to their aircraft.
As aircraft ...
– a line that extends along the side of an aircraft – which turns up at the end and goes up the tailfin.
References
{{reflist
External links
How hockey sticks are made video
Stick
Stick or the stick may refer to:
Thin elongated objects
* Twig
* The weapon used in stick fighting
* Walking stick, a device to facilitate balancing while walking
* Shepherd's crook
* Swagger stick
* Digging stick
* Swizzle stick, used to stir d ...