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Wayne Gretzky is almost universally regarded as the greatest ice hockey player of all time. Nicknamed The Great One, he holds over 60 NHL records, including career points (2,857), goals (894, until Alexander Ovechkin passed him in 2025), and assists (1,963), a margin so vast it is considered unbreakable. He won four Stanley Cups and nine MVP awards. The main challengers for the top spot are Bobby Orr, who revolutionized defence, and Mario Lemieux, whose pure talent rivalled anyone's. Because eras differ so much, debate below Gretzky is endless, but his statistical dominance places him beyond serious dispute as number one.

Both are stoppages, but they penalize different things. Offside occurs on the attack: a player may not cross the opponent's blue line into the offensive zone before the puck does. If he does, play stops and a face-off is held outside the zone. Icing occurs when a team shoots the puck from behind the centre red line all the way past the opponent's goal line without anyone touching it; play stops and the face-off returns to the offending team's end, and that team cannot change its tired players. Put simply, offside governs entering the attacking zone, while icing prevents teams from harmlessly firing the puck the length of the ice to relieve pressure.

Fighting is uniquely tolerated in North American professional hockey, though it is penalized. Two players who fight each receive a five-minute major, and because both sit out, neither team gains a man advantage. Historically, fighting served to police dangerous play, deterring cheap shots through the threat of retaliation, and to shift momentum or protect star players. It is not permitted in Olympic, international or most college hockey, where it brings ejection. In the modern NHL, fighting has declined dramatically as the game prioritizes speed and skill and as concerns about head injuries have grown. The designated enforcer role has nearly disappeared, though spontaneous fights still occur and remain part of the sport's contested culture.

An ice hockey game consists of three periods of 20 minutes of playing time each, for 60 minutes of regulation. Because the clock stops on every whistle, a game takes roughly two and a half hours of real time, including two intermissions during which the ice is resurfaced. If the score is tied after regulation, the game goes to overtime. NHL regular-season overtime is a five-minute, sudden-death period played three skaters per side, followed by a shootout if still tied. In the playoffs, teams instead play full 20-minute sudden-death overtime periods until someone scores, occasionally producing marathon games that stretch well past midnight into a fifth or sixth period.

A hat trick is when a single player scores three goals in one game. The term, borrowed from cricket, is celebrated in hockey by fans throwing their hats onto the ice, a tradition dating back decades, and play pauses while the crew clears them. Related feats have their own names: a natural hat trick is three consecutive goals by the same player with no one else scoring in between, and a Gordie Howe hat trick, named for the legend, is a goal, an assist and a fight all in one game. Scoring four goals is sometimes informally called a Texas hat trick. A hat trick remains one of hockey's signature individual achievements.

When a player commits a penalty, he serves time in the penalty box and his team plays short-handed, usually with four skaters instead of five. The opposing team then has a power play, a man advantage it tries to exploit by setting up in the offensive zone to create high-quality scoring chances. The short-handed team's job is the penalty kill: clearing the puck, blocking shots and running out the clock until the penalty expires. Most minor penalties last two minutes but end early if the power-play team scores. A good NHL power play converts around 20 to 25 percent of its chances, making special teams a decisive factor in tight games and especially in the playoffs.