Picture this: it’s Saturday night, and the Vancouver Canucks are taking on the Edmonton Oilers in the opening weekend of 2025-26 season.
Quinn Hughes collects the puck behind Thatcher Demko’s net, surveys the ice, and threads a crisp forward pass to Elias Pettersson, who glides through the neutral zone before flicking a backhand to Brock Boeser on the wing.
The play unfolds in seconds, fluid, instinctive, and familiar.
But rewind nearly a century, and that same pass would have been illegal.
Before 1928, hockey was a puck-carrying game, more like rugby on ice. You could pass backward or sideways, but never forward. There were no blue lines, no penalty shots, and no numbers on jerseys. Goalies couldn’t drop to their knees. Line changes didn’t exist. The team that finished first in the standings was crowned champion.
No playoffs, no upsets, no Stanley Cup run.
Then came Frank and Lester Patrick, two brothers living in Victoria, who would transform the game forever.
“Their list is impressive,” Jason Beck, curator of the BC Sports Hall of Fame, told Victoria News. “Everything from the blue line to forward passing, player numbers, goalies being allowed to drop to their knees, the playoff system, even assists, so many fundamental parts of modern hockey were invented or experimented with by the Patricks.”
The Patrick brothers’ fingerprints are everywhere in the sport.
Between them, they introduced 22 rules that remain embedded in the NHL rulebook.
Born in eastern Canada, Lester in Drummondville in 1883 and Frank in Ottawa in 1885, the brothers grew up steeped in the game.
Their father, Joe, was a lumber magnate with a passion for hockey.
When the family moved west, Joe invested in the sport’s future by financing and building two artificial ice arenas: the 10,500-seat Denman Arena in Vancouver, the largest in Canada at the time, and the 3,500-seat Patrick Arena in Victoria, home of the 1925 Stanley Cup Champions.
They were the first artificial ice rinks in the country, and they became laboratories for innovation.
From those rinks, the Patricks launched the Pacific Coast Hockey Association in 1911.
Frank managed and played for the Vancouver Millionaires, while Lester took on the same roles for the Victoria Aristocrats, later renamed the Cougars. The league became a testing ground for ideas that would shape hockey for generations.
“Hockey was much different before that,” Beck said. “You didn’t see as much passing, and if you did, it looked like rugby. Whoever had the puck was leading the rush, and there was no way to make a breakaway pass. Once forward passing came in, it completely changed the pace and creativity of the game. It became faster, more exciting.”
Beck points to the blue line as one of Frank Patrick’s greatest contributions.
It introduced zones to the ice, allowing for structured offensive and defensive play. “That’s the foundation of how the game is strategized today,” he said.
The brothers were also business-minded.
The idea of splitting games into three periods wasn’t just to give players a break, it created more time to sell at concessions.
Numbered jerseys weren’t just for organization, they sold programs. Even the playoff system, now a hallmark of North American sport, was born from their desire to extend the season and attract fans.
“Before the Patricks, whoever finished first in the standings was champion,” Beck explained. “They introduced playoffs as a way to play more games and sell more tickets. Every major North American sport has adopted that model now.”
Their changes extended to how goalies played the position.
Before the Patricks, goaltenders had to stay upright, unable to drop to their knees.
“That rule changed everything,” Beck said. “It affected how goalies defended the net and how shooters attacked. Before that, most goals were scored along the ice. Once goalies could drop down, shooters started lifting the puck, and that completely altered the skill set of both positions.”
Frank went on to coach and manage the Vancouver Maroons, while Lester later became coach and general manager of the New York Rangers, leading them to a Stanley Cup in 1928.
Both were inducted into the Hockey Hall of Fame, while Frank was inducted into the BC Sports Hall of Fame and the Canadian Sports Hall of Fame.
When Beck talks about the Patricks during tours at the BC Sports Hall of Fame, visitors are stunned.
“Jaws drop,” he said. “People can’t believe how much of modern hockey traces back to these two brothers from Victoria. You list everything they’re responsible for, and it’s mind-blowing.”
Beck paused before adding, “If they’re not the most important innovators in hockey history, they’re certainly top three. You’ll never see another Frank or Lester Patrick come along. The game’s too entrenched now. There’ll be minor changes, sure, but nothing like what they did. They reshaped hockey into what we know today.”
Every time a goalie drops into a butterfly, every time a player glides over the blue line or a game is decided in a playoff series, the spirit of the Patricks endures.
So next time your favourite player coughs up the puck and it leads to a goal against, just be thankful the Patricks had a vision that not everyone could see.
