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The game of hockey is much like the surface on which it is played. Zambonis scrub the ice every 20 minutes (more frequently during outdoor games) to ostensibly restore it to a baseline state. But within minutes the ebb and flow of the game has carved a unique set of circumstances for the ensuing period of play.
Seen through our eyes, the game of hockey looks rather static. The pace of change is slow. But as we zoom out to study the sport over time we can see that the ebb and flow of factors have carved the game into definable epochs, each one different and most a golden age in its own right.
Below is a timeline of the history of the NHL. The blue line shows the average number of goals per game. The red line shows the number of teams. And the white and grey bars divide the timeline into observable eras: The edges of eras are always difficult to identify with precision, but I have identified six NHL epochs (note that I refer to seasons by their concluding year).
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The Formative Years (1918-1930)
The NHL was formed out the rubble of the National Hockey Association with a league comprised of the Montreal Canadiens, Montreal Wanderers, Ottawa Senators and Toronto Arenas (now the Maple Leafs). It was not the beginning of elite professional hockey in North America, but it was the beginning of the rapid consolidation of talent into one premier league.
It was a period of intense development. Expansion grew the league to 10 teams by 1927. Two competing, Western-based leagues failed and the talent came East. There was rapid development of rules and strategy throughout the 1920s.
The principal evidence of frenetic change is that scoring plummeted from an average of nearly 10 to less than 3 goals per game over this era. Rule-making efforts to maintain offence could not keep pace with the development of the skills and strategy of goal prevention.
The 1920s were, in a sense, much like today. The league was struggling with the rise of goal prevention. During the 1929 season, Montreal goaltender George Hainsworth set an NHL record that still stands with a goals-against average of 0.98 (and recorded 22 shutouts).
Context matters in any study of history. In the NHL's inaugural season, Joe Malone scored 44 goals in just 20 games. Unadjusted for context this is the most impressive single-season scoring feat in NHL history. But the context to consider is that scoring has never been as high and players averaged about 40 minutes per game of ice time (Malone surely got more).
This was a golden age of change. These were turbulent times, pioneering times. Reputations of frontiersmen are usually larger than life. This was the era of Malone, Hainsworth, Georges Vezina, Howie Morenz, Aurel Joliat, Frank Nighbor, Newsy Lalonde, Sprague Cleghorn and Cy Denneny.
The Adolescent Years (1931-1939)
If you were able to teleport back to watch a 1920s game, you might not recognize it. The game was defined by the notion of legal and illegal passes. Defensive strategies evolved quickly and, by the end of the decade, generating offence had become too difficult.
In the face of this stifling defensive bias, the league took drastic action for the 1930 season and eliminated virtually all restrictions on passing. Offence doubled but the perception was that the game was at risk of becoming a farce. For the 1931 season a dramatic overall of the rules turned the game substantially into its modern form.
Another major development occurred around the same time. Hockey transitioned from a game played by six players and some substitutes to a team game involving forward lines, defensive pairs and changes "on the fly". Roster sizes expanded and, by 1932, average ice time had declined to less than 23 minutes per game.
