Everything you need to know about overtime rules in the NHL, from the main features of NHL overtime rules and how overtime works in the playoffs.
What Does Overtime Mean
Traditionally, a hockey game lasts three periods, with the team that leads at the end of that final period. Each period in an NHL game lasts 20 minutes, with an intermission following the first and second periods. But there’s not always a winner at the end of regulation play. What happens if the two teams are tied?
Every sport has different rules for how to handle this situation, which is usually referred to as overtime. Some play for a set amount of time and the leader after that time is the winner. Some play sudden-death overtimes, where the first score wins. Baseball plays one extra inning at a time, going on until one team has the lead at the end of an inning.
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These are some of the most exciting moments in sports, because the importance of winning is magnified in those moments.
NHL Overtime General Rules
So, how does the NHL handle overtime? In one of the most interesting ways in sports.
NHL overtime is sudden death, meaning the first team to score wins the contest. But unlike many sports leagues, the NHL changes the makeup of the teams during overtime, with a 3-on-3 format, with three skaters and a goalkeeper on the ice. The teams play a five-minute period, with the first team to score a goal winning.
If a regular season NHL game remains tied at the conclusion of this five-minute period, the game goes to a shootout. Each team selects three shooters for three rounds of shootout, with each team shooting once per round. The leading team at the end of the three rounds wins.
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If the teams remain tied after this, the teams will continue the shootout on a round-by-round basis until one team scores and the other misses.
NHL Playoff Overtime Rules
Some sports leagues alter their playoff overtime rules, but many alter them more substantially than NHL.
During the postseason, there are no shootouts, so teams will play sudden-death overtime until there’s a winner. The teams play full 20-minute periods, allowing time for intermissions if the game remains tied after each period. But the same general idea exists as in the regular season: score a goal and win.
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The playoff overtime is played as 5-on-5 hockey, not the 3-on-3 hockey of the regular season overtime. In a way, it’s a simpler system, and it’s also viewed as more fair. Shootouts are exciting, but they don’t necessarily reflect which team played the better game of hockey.
Overtime Rules Fun Facts
The NHL has made many changes to its overtime format throughout the years, both regular season and playoff.
- From World War II until the end of the 1982-83 season, regular season games that were tied at the end of regulation would end in a tie. Prior to the war, teams had played a traditional 5-on-5 overtime period.
- The longest overtime period in an NHL game too place in 1936, going to a sixth overtime in a 1-0 Detroit Red Wings win over the Montreal Maroons. The longest since the 1983 rule change came in a 2000 game between the Flyers and Penguins, with the Flyers winning 2-1 in the fifth overtime.
- After the return of overtime, teams played a five-minute, sudden-death period in which the losing team earned one point and the winning team two points. There was no shootout, so if the game was tied after overtime, both teams earned a point in the standings.
- The shootout was added in 2005 following the NHL lockout.
- The 3-on-3 format began in 2015.
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