Canadian Sports

Do you know what the national sport of Canada is?  If you guessed hockey, and I bet 90% of you did, you’d be partially right.  Canada actually has two national sports - lacrosse in the summer and hockey in the winter.  They just want to be different!

Most of us associate Canada with hockey, which makes sense because it is such a large part of the culture, and Canada is a huge force in the NHL. Currently there are 6 Canadian teams in the NHL – but there were as many as 8 at one time.  And, a large percentage of players in the NHL are Canadian.  See this link which shows 52% were Canadian in the ’08 – ’09 season.  

But, besides hockey, what are the other popular professional sports?

The Canadian Football League (CFL) is the second biggest spectator sport after hockey.  This is “American” football,, versus soccer but the CFL has some different rules than the NFL including size of the team, layout of the field, and the number of downs.  See this link for a comparison of the two leagues.  People in Canada still watch a lot of NFL football even though there isn't an NFL team in Canada as of now.  The drive from Toronto to Buffalo is pretty easy so people go down to watch the Bills regularly.  And, the Bills even play games at "home" in Toronto twice during the year at the Rogers Centre.

Soccer seems to really be growing in Canada (and they do call it soccer).  There are soon to be 3 Canadian teams in the MLS.  Toronto FC has sold out every game of the past several years.

Baseball and basketball which are very big in the US are not as popular here even though basketball was developed in Canada.  In Toronto they are still pretty popular because they have major teams here that play in the NBA (Toronto Raptors) and MLB (Toronto Blue Jays). 

Lacrosse is the official Canadian summer sport, and has its origins with the native people of Canada.  Supposedly the Toronto Rock have a strong following, though I haven't experienced it yet.  Again, Toronto is the only NLL (National Lacrosse League) team from Canada.

  

Have you heard of Bandy?  So this isn’t necessarily a big sport, but I had to comment on it because we have a friend that plays on the Canadian national team.  Bandy is a sport I had never heard of and I bet many of you haven’t (a little education for you!).  It is a cross between hockey and soccer – picture skates, ice, and stick, but soccer size field and team.  The NY Times had a good article on it that is worth reading.  http://www.nytimes.com/2010/01/29/sports/olympics/29bandy.html?_r=1&pagewanted=1&th&emc=th  As I did some research I came to find out the American Bandy Association is headquartered in Minnesota – and all games are played right by where I grew up at the John Rose Oval in Roseville.  Right under my nose all the time and I never knew! 

So this just scratches the surface on some of the interesting things I learned about team sports here in Canada - there is much more besides just the major leagues of all of these sports, but too much for one post.  And then there are the individual sports - another day.