The sporting culture of Canada consists of a variety of games. Although there are many contests that Canadians value, the most common are ice hockey, Canadian football, basketball, soccer, and baseball.
Ice hockey, referred to as simply hockey in the country, is Canada's most prevalent winter sport, its most popular spectator sport, and its most successful sport in international competition. Lacrosse, a sport with Aboriginal origins, is Canada's oldest and official sport. Canadian football is Canada's second most popular spectator sport, and the Canadian Football League's annual championship, the Grey Cup, is the country's largest annual sports event. Association football, known in Canada as soccer in both English and French, has the most registered players of any sport in Canada, but has yet to enjoy the sustained popularity as a major professional sport. However, throughout the last two decades, soccer has showed an improvement in terms of popularity through its associations and club structures at the provincial and national levels. With growing media coverage it will likely rival the traditional sports in the 21st century.
Other popular team sports include curling, street hockey, cricket, rugby, soccer and softball. Cricket is the fastest growing sport in Canada currently. Popular individual sports include auto racing, boxing, cycling, golf, hiking, horse racing, ice skating, rodeo, skateboarding, skiing, snowboarding, swimming, tennis, triathlon, track and field, water sports, and wrestling. As a country with a generally cool climate, Canada has enjoyed greater success at the Winter Olympics than at the Summer Olympics, although significant regional variations in climate allow for a wide variety of both team and individual sports. Major upcoming multi-sport events in Canada include the 2010 Winter Olympics.
Great achievements in Canadian sport are recognized by Canada's Sports Hall of Fame, while the Lou Marsh Trophy is awarded annually to Canada's top athlete by a panel of journalists.
Official sports
Since its founding, Canada's official sport was lacrosse, a sport invented by Aboriginal peoples. In 1994, First Nations groups objected to a government bill that proposed establishing ice hockey as Canada's national sport, arguing that it neglected recognition of the game of lacrosse, a uniquely Native contribution. In response, the House of Commons amended a bill "to recognize hockey as Canada's Winter Sport and lacrosse as Canada's Summer Sport," although lacrosse is played all year, in all seasons, indoor and outdoors. On May 12, 1994, in Bill C-212, ice hockey joined lacrosse as official sports of Canada.
Ice hockey
The modern form of ice hockey began in Canada in the late 1800s, and is widely considered Canada's national pastime, with high levels of participation by children, men and women at various levels of competition. The most popular leagues are the amateur Canadian Hockey League, and the professional National Hockey League, which has six teams in Canada: the Montreal Canadiens, Ottawa Senators, Toronto Maple Leafs, Calgary Flames, Edmonton Oilers, and Vancouver Canucks. The Canadian NHL presence peaked with eight teams in the mid-1990s, before the Quebec Nordiques relocated to Denver, Colorado in 1995 and the Winnipeg Jets relocated to Phoenix, Arizona in 1996. Hockey Night in Canada is a longtime national Saturday night television broadcast featuring Canadian NHL teams. Hockey Canada is the sport's official governing body in Canada and is a member of the International Ice Hockey Federation.
Lacrosse
The First Nations began playing the sport more than 500 years ago. Today lacrosse not only remains an integral part of native culture, but is played by tens of thousands of people across Canada and the north eastern United States. From its origin as 'The Creator's Game' to the overwhelming popularity of the Toronto Rock and the modern game, lacrosse has survived the test of time after treading down a long, controversial path that led it to become recognized as Canada's official national sport. It's commonly assumed that Lacrosse was named Canada's National sport by Parliament in 1859. To date, documented evidence has not been uncovered for this claim. In a 1994 controversial and advantageous effort to raise the profile of Canadian hockey in the international arena resulted in lacrosse, through an act of parliament, becoming the official summer sport of Canada.
The Canadian Lacrosse Association, founded in 1925, is the governing body of lacrosse in Canada. It conducts national junior and senior championship tournaments for men and women in both field and box lacrosse. It also participated in the inaugural World Indoor Lacrosse Championship in 2003. The National Lacrosse League is a professional box lacrosse league, with franchises in Canada and the United States. The 2006 World Lacrosse Championship was held in London, Ontario. Canada beat the United States 15-10 in the final to break a 28-year U.S. winning streak. One of the best lacrosse players of all time, Gary Gait was born in Victoria, British Columbia and has won every possible major lacrosse championship. Great achievements in Canadian Lacrosse are recognized by the Canadian Lacrosse Hall of Fame.
Team sports
Baseball
The world's first documented baseball game took place in Beachville, Ontario on June 4th, 1838. Although more strongly associated with the United States, baseball has existed in Canada from the very beginning. The world's oldest baseball park still in operation is Labatt Park in London, Ontario. It is home to the London Majors of the semi-pro Intercounty Baseball League.
The Toronto Blue Jays are Canada's only Major League Baseball team, founded in 1977. The Montreal Expos club played in Montreal from 1969 until 2004 when they moved to Washington, D.C. and became the Washington Nationals. The Blue Jays were the first non-American team to host a World Series Game (in 1992) and the only non-American team to win the World Series (back to back in 1992 and 1993). The Blue Jays had the highest attendance in Major League Baseball during the late 1980s and early 1990s. Professional baseball has a long history in Canada, beginning with teams such as the London Tecumsehs, Montreal Royals, and Toronto Maple Leafs in the late 1800s and early 1900s. All three were included on the National Baseball Association's top 100 minor league teams.
A number of Canadians have played in the major leagues, and several have won the highest honors in baseball. Ferguson Jenkins won the National League Cy Young Award in 1971 as the best pitcher in the league, and in 1991 became the first Canadian inducted in the Baseball Hall of Fame. Larry Walker was National League MVP for the 1997 season and was the league's Batting Champion 3 times. Éric Gagné won the National League Cy Young Award in 2003. Jason Bay was the first Canadian to win rookie of the year honors in 2004, and Justin Morneau was the American League MVP for the 2006 season.
Canada participated in the 2006 World Baseball Classic, in which it upset Team USA in first-round play, which some people in Canada call the "Miracle on Dirt" (a play on the phrase "Miracle on Ice" for the 1980 U.S. Olympic Hockey team). There are a number of minor league, semi-professional and collegiate baseball teams in Canada (see List of baseball teams in Canada). Great achievements in Canadian baseball are recognized by the Canadian Baseball Hall of Fame.
Basketball
Basketball has very strong roots in Canada. The inventor, James Naismith, was Canadian; born in Almonte, Ontario, he was working as a physical education instructor in Massachusetts when he created the game in 1891. As many as 10 of the players in that first game were Canadians students from Quebec. The National Basketball Association (NBA) recognizes its first ever game as being a contest between the New York Knickerbockers and Toronto Huskies at Toronto's Maple Leaf Gardens on November 1, 1946.
Basketball is a popular sport in parts of Canada, especially in Nova Scotia and more recently southern Ontario. The NBA expanded into Canada in 1995 with the addition of the Toronto Raptors and Vancouver Grizzlies. The Grizzlies moved to Memphis, Tennessee in 2001, but the Raptors continue to draw healthy crowds at the Air Canada Centre. The 2005 and 2006 NBA MVP, Steve Nash, is from British Columbia and has played in international competitions for Canada's national team.
The popularity of basketball in Nova Scotia is at the high school and college level. Nova Scotia is home to three perennially strong college basketball programs. Saint Mary's University, Acadia University, and St. Francis Xavier University have made 22, 21, and 13 appearances in the Canadian University championship, respectively. Carleton University has dominated the Canadian University championship in recent years, winning six titles in seven years from 2003 to 2009.
Footbal
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