Welcome To The Trapezoid!

Every year in every league across the globe, there are rule changes implemented for a number of reasons. Most are made for safety reasons which, to me, would be a valid and acceptable reason for making those changes. Others, though, are made to simply fall in line with larger governing bodies. This latter reason is why the EIHL has decided, for the first time in the British league's history, to implement the trapezoid we see in the NHL and in IIHF tournaments. While the EIHL cites their reasons for doing so, I'm not sure that using the trapezoid will change anything in the EIHL this season.

The reason that the rule was introduced in the NHL after the 2004-05 was to give opposition players a chance to recover pucks that they dumped in the zone before a goalie who had some good stickhandling skills could retrieve from behind the net and play it up to his defenders. Goalies like Martin Brodeur, Mike Smith, and Marty Turco were three goalies who were particularly good at making these types of transitions, but they were also three of the fewest penalized for playing the puck outside the trapezoid behind the goal line.

So why have the trapezoid if goalies weren't really the problem in the first place? What's keeping it on the ice?

Great question, and it's one that not many people can answer with absolute commitment to the way the rules were written about this oddly-shaped zone on the ice.

If goalies can still skate out of their nets above the goal line and play the puck, the trapezoid isn't a factor. If goaltenders rarely skate into the corners to play the puck, the trapezoid isn't a factor. The only time, it seems, where the trapezoid becomes a factor is when a puck takes a funny bounce or slows down around the boards that cause the goaltenders to get caught out of their nets. That shouldn't be the purpose of the rule.

The NHL and IIHF will claim that it increases scoring chances by forcing the defender to play the puck while being pursued by an opposing forward who is looking to recover the puck that was dumped in. The problem, though, is that the goaltenders are still doing what they've always done - stopping the dumped-in puck behind their nets so the defender can pick it up easily. In other words, the trapezoid isn't a factor in generating more offensive chances off dump-ins because the entire purpose of the dump-in is counter to generating offence.

If we take this one step further as was often seen with Martin Brodeur, the dump-in often will allow teams to make line changes, but the trapezoid actually reduces the chances of a goalie stepping out of his crease, cutting off the dump-in long before it gets to the trapezoid area, and transitioning the puck back up the ice before the line-changing team can get setup. The trapezoid actually encourages stale hockey rather than the excitement and chaos of catching a team in a line change. So why do we still have the trapezoid again?

"Ultimately purpose of the trapezoid is to create more scoring chances in the game of hockey, which is why the International Ice Hockey Federation has adopted it for all IIHF-sanctioned leagues going forward," Hicks stated. "Our 10 arenas will all be ready with the new markings for the start of pre-season."

The only problem is that we know that's not true. All Mike Hicks is doing in that statement is reciting rhetoric to fans rather than showing up with data to prove that the trapezoid increases scoring chances. The IIHF also deserves some heat here because there's no proof that implementing the trapezoid increases scoring chancer either, especially on larger ice surfaces where goalies are less inclined to wander away from their nets. And if they're less inclined to play the puck away from their nets where chaos often ensues, it means that scoring chances decrease because they're making the safe play more often.

You're likely getting a "Teebz hates the trapezoid" feeling from this article, and it's true: I hate the trapezoid. Playing the puck for a goaltender is a skill, and the NHL and IIHF are telling goaltenders that skill isn't important in their games. We, as fans, lament the fact that our goalies often fumble or mishandle a puck leading to a goal, but there's no reason for them to work on being a good stickhandler if they're being told just to stop pucks for the defenders behind the net.

What made New Jersey difficult to defeat is that Brodeur worked like an extra defender in his own zone, often transitiong pucks back up the ice before the opposition was set. Yes, he got caught out of the net on occasion, but he also generated a ton of offence by sending pucks up to his defenders and forwards long before the opposition could successfully change lines. His 45 career assists are proof that he could play the puck well as part of New Jersey's offensive attack when he was allowed to patrol his own zone. The fact that he also has two career goals proves that Martin Brodeur could handle the puck well.

With the EIHL moving to the trapezoid this season, I doubt we'll see a bump in scoring in their games like Mike Hicks suggested above. If anything, we'll see more goalies making the safe plays rather than taking risks, and that means less opportunities for scoring because goalies will be in position more often.

And don't expect to see a lot of highly-skilled, masked stickhandlers come out of the EIHL either because the trapezoid makes that skill rather useless for netminders in the grand scheme of things. That means stickhandling goaltenders are finding themselves to be like the trapezoid - rather useless in how they affect the game at all.

Until next time, keep your sticks on the ice!