On Hockey (and Why it Fascinates this Writer)

NHL Playoffs are upon us. As I write this, my beloved Vegas Golden Knights (VGK to their fans) have just been eliminated in the second round against the Edmonton Oilers.

            I encounter it a lot. “Why do you like hockey?”

            It’s often said with a tone. Or a quizzical look. Frequently with genuine curiosity.

It’s usually asked of me while I’m only half listening because I’m looking past/over/through whoever asked to the game playing behind their head.

Maybe I give off a bookish vibe. Maybe because I am a thirty-something-woman. Maybe it’s obvious I didn’t grow up in a sporty household.

“Because I’m a writer,” I’ll respond.

More quizzical looks.

Here, inevitably, I will embark on the following diatribe in response.

There is an episode of Rick and Morty—­stay with me, I promise this is related. There is an episode (season 6 episode 7, “Full Metal JackRick” for those so inclined) in which our titular antiheroes find themselves caught in a meta-reality loop of misadventure, facing a gang of self-referential characters and eventually a narrative adversary. Rick says of the main foe’s prison, “They’ve got him in a cell made of sports because it’s the opposite of story.”

Sports are the opposite of story.

Rick and Morty facing off against Rhett Caan

I have devoted so much of my life to studying the craft of story—analyzing plot, breaking down character, examining narrative arcs. Even as I read for leisure, I am putting myself in the author’s (or, frequently, the editor’s) shoes, predicting story structure and plot devices. I am always looking for Chekhov’s gun, zeroing in on a red herring, frustrated by a deus ex machina. I’ve trained my internal eye to see the structure beneath the story. In order to learn, to better my craft, I anticipate.

And then came hockey.

One afternoon in 2020 when public events were just starting to commence after the pandemic shutdown, a friend invited my husband and me to go to a minor league hockey game. I hadn’t really wanted to go. I thought I would be bored to tears. But the tickets had already been bought, and we had nothing better to do on a random weeknight.

The delight came in waves. First, the initial enjoyment—it was, in fact, not boring at all, but fast paced and engaging. Then came the joy at the fact that I could still be surprised. That I could surprise myself.

The husband and me in Dallas to watch our Knights battle the Stars the year we won the Cup

As I examined my newfound pleasure at something I had previously judged and disparaged (sports as a whole, really, but sure, throw hockey in with the rest of ‘em.) Why? What about this ritualistic battle on ice was appealing to me?

It took a few seasons of watching and learning about the sport, its facets and minutia (I’m a research driven writer who’s mildly compulsive, so yeah. I studied. I read books about hockey. I went all in.) to realize what it was that so compelled me.

Here at last. Something to root for, with forces of good (the home team) and forces of opposition (the away team) just like in any good narrative. And yet, try as I might, I could not predict the outcome.

It feels like story, but it’s the opposite of story. Sometimes there are happy endings. Sometimes there are dark nights of the soul (this last loss against the Oilers has me feeling pretty all-is-lost-ish). There will always be the Chosen One—Jack Eichel to Vegas fans, but yes, Connor McDavid of the Oilers is literally called McJesus. There’s honor. There’s lore. Might Bedard be the next Gretzky? Remember the famous Bruins Brawl of ’79?

But…

There is no architect of this story. No one’s pulling the strings. No man behind the curtain.

Just five guys, flicking around a half pound rubber disk with awkward shaped sticks while balancing on blades, and sometimes fighting. Oh, and one extra guy who occasionally has to do the splits and sacrifice his groin to prevent a goal.

Three periods. Twenty minutes of play each. An epic battle with no narrative at all.

How positively refreshing.