Hockey is the fast game played with curved sticks and a flat disc, often on ice. Play hockey, a hockey stick, ice hockey.
The word means different games in different countries: in North America hockey is ice hockey by default and elsewhere it is the field game with a ball. Ice hockey is among the fastest team sports, with a puck travelling well over a hundred miles an hour. Note that the origin of the word is unknown.
1nounhockeyA fast team game played with curved sticks.
“The girls play hockey on the school field every Wednesday.”
hockey is a sport.
Also accepted in games: ice hockey
Hockey appears in the sixteenth century and its origin is unknown. A French word for a shepherd's crook has been suggested.
Built from
16th century, of unknown origin. Possibly related to hook due to the curvature of the stick, akin to hock + -ey, or from hoquet (“shepherd's staff, crook”), which resembles a hockey stick, via a diminutive form of hoc from hoec (“hook”), a cognate of Old English hōc.
Etymology from Wiktionary, CC BY-SA