Ice hockey in the United States the ice which divided the ice into three sections, goaltenders are allowed to fall and slide on the ice to help prevent the other team from scoring a goal, forward passing is permitted in the neutral zone, and the game was split into three periods of 20 minutes. In 1912, the game changed again reducing the number of on-ice players to six players from the previous seven. The NHL is the major professional hockey league in North America, with 24 U.S.-based teams and 7 Canadian-based teams competing for the Stanley Cup. While NHL stars are still not as readily familiar
Ice hockey in Slovakia Federation in what was then Czechoslovakia. The first organized competition was held in 1930. Throughout the course of ice hockey history in Czechoslovakia, many Slovak players became eligible to play for the Czechoslovak national team. Among those who were able achieve this was Ladislav Troják; A native of Košice who left for Prague in 1934 to play for the LTC Praha, which was at those times considered to be the best ice hockey team in the country. From there he was only a step away from playing for the national team. Czechoslovakia and its successor states are rated as being