What Are Canada's Two National Sports?

Canada is a country that enjoys many different sports. They include:

● Ice hockey

● Lacrosse

● Soccer

● Baseball

● Cricket

● Tennis and more

The most commonly played sports are hockey and lacrosse. Both of these games are very popular in Canada, but Canadians take the game of hockey much more seriously than they do lacrosse. Here is more insight on how each sport came to be Canada's favourite.

Hockey

The most popular league is the National Hockey League (NHL). Who invented hockey? A man named James Creighton. He was a student at McGill University in Montreal, Quebec, and he brought the first rules to his school. Those were from an English game called field hockey which had been played for centuries already.

In 1875, it spread quickly across Canada as winter sports started becoming popular. Then slowly, by the 1890s, they became professional games with organized leagues and teams. Those early days of playing meant you could make money off of people watching your team play.

Hockey has become a national sport today because Canada has so many talented players who grew up dreaming about joining a top league like NHL since they were little kids.

The first organized ice hockey game was in Montreal, Quebec, on March 30, 1875, at Victoria Skating Rink. A group of young men, including James Creighton and several McGill University students, created The Amateur Hockey Association of Canada (AHAC).

This league allowed teams to play against one another for a trophy known today as the Stanley Cup. All these players were playing because it had become popular during the winter months. People would even pay admission fees to watch other people play.

Eventually, by the 1890s, they became professional games with organized leagues and teams, which gradually spread across Canada since it was so cold out there all year round already. Players began making money from spectators who wanted to see them perform.

Lacrosse

Canada's national sport is Lacrosse. It was an Olympic medal event in the 1904 games but has not appeared since then because it is sport-specific to Native Canadians. Lacrosse is played between two teams of ten players each, which use wooden sticks with netting at one end called crosse's to pick up and pass the ball from player to player as they attempt to score by throwing it into an opponents' goal or shooting it over a crossbar.

The three most essential principles of lacrosse are:

Carrying the Stick

Players may have their sticks either below or above their waists, but never higher than their shoulders except for when going offside then carrying must be done diagonally across the body until out of bounds/zone lines

Throwing

When passing, teammates must travel more than three metres (ten feet) to prevent opposing players from intercepting them.

Going offside

When a player crosses one of the imaginary lines which run perpendicular to the sidelines across the field, they are "offside" and must not interfere with the play until their team regains possession or they return on the side.

Hockey and lacrosse are Canada's two official national sports. While it can be argued that hockey is the country's biggest sport, there isn't a single other activity in which Canadians take part more than playing lacrosse. Therefore, it would make sense to call both of these games Canadian’s national sports.