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When was the first organized hockey team founded?

On January 31, 1877, McGill University students started the first organized ice hockey club. Employing codified rules, hockey officials, and team uniforms, the McGill University Hockey Club played a challenge match against a loose collection of lacrosse and football players. McGill beat its opponents 2–1.

Quickies

Did you know …

that Montreal’s Victoria Skating Rink, which opened for business in 1862, was the first building in Canada to be electrified, and was the scene of the first Stanley Cup playoff game in 1894? The arena closed for good in 1937. Today its site features a parking garage.

Why is Toronto’s hockey team called the Maple Leafs?

In 1927, after having just been fired by the Rangers, Conn Smythe took the winnings from a horse race and bought the Toronto St. Pats hockey team, renaming them the Maple Leafs. Impressed with how brilliantly Canadians had fought in the First World War, Smythe named his new team after the soldiers’ maple leaf insignia. Smythe is the man who said of hockey, “If you can’t beat them in the alley, you can’t beat them on the ice.”