The National Hockey League (NHL) ( ) is a professional ice hockey league composed of 30 teams in North America. It is the premier professional ice hockey league in the world, and one of the North American major professional sports leagues. The Stanley Cup, the oldest professional sports trophy in North America, is awarded annually to the league champion at the end of each season.

The league was formed in 1917 in Montreal, Quebec, Canada from a predecessor organization, the National Hockey Association (NHA), founded in 1909. It started with four teams, and through a series of expansions, contractions and relocations, the league is now composed of 30 teams, 24 of which are based in the United States and six in Canada. After a labour

The NHL draws many highly skilled players from all over the world. Currently, the league has players from about 20 different countries. Canadians have historically constituted over half of the players in the NHL because both the sport and the league originated in Canada. In the past 25 years, the percentages of American and European players have increased because of the NHL's continued expansion into the United States, its high standard of play compared to other leagues, and the availability of highly skilled European players.

main: History of the National Hockey League After a series of disputes in the Canadian National Hockey Association (NHA) between Eddie Livingstone, who was the owner of the Toronto Blueshirts, and other owners, the owners of the Montreal Canadiens, Montreal Wanderers, Ottawa Senators, and Quebec Bulldogs met at the Windsor Hotel in Montreal to talk about the NHA's future.1, pp.15–16 Their discussions eventually led to the creation of the National Hockey League on November 22, 1917. Three former NHA franchises, the Canadiens, Wanderers and Senators were founding members of the NHL, along with a new Toronto franchise. Because of the dispute, the Toronto team was given temporarily to the Toronto Arena Corp to operate, and is often referred to as the Arenas, though they operated without a nickname.Toronto Arena Hockey Club was founded in October 1918. see 2

Even though the league struggled to stay in business during its first decade, the NHL's teams were very successful on the ice; only once, in 1925, did a team from any other league win the Stanley Cup, and by 1926 the NHL was the only league competing for the Cup.3, pp.5 The NHL then started a process of expansion: the Boston Bruins (the first U.S.-based NHL franchise) and Montreal Maroons entered the league in 1924–25; the New York Americans and the Pittsburgh Pirates entered in the 1925–26 season; and the New York Rangers, Chicago Black Hawks (now spelled Blackhawks), and Detroit Cougars (now known as the Red Wings) entered in the 1926–27 season, raising the number of teams in the NHL to ten. The Great Depression and the onset of World War II, took a toll on the league, and by 1942 the NHL was reduced to six teams. These six teams (the Montreal Canadiens, Toronto Maple Leafs, Detroit Red Wings, Chicago Black Hawks, Boston Bruins, and New York Rangers) are collectively known as the Original Six, and for the next quarter-century were the only teams in the National Hockey League. During this time the Norris family had influence over four of the teams as Detroit and Chicago were operated by members of the family, and Boston and New York had mortgages to the family. The media would nickname the league the "Norris House League."