Attention writers
Now in it's 10th year, Hockey Player® is the No. 1 instructional source for ice, roller and street hockey players. Currently, the site features nealry 500 articles of interest to youth and adult hockey players, parents of youth players and coaches.

Are you a hockey writer, coach or skills clinician? We're looking for quality articles, drills and tips for our paid and free content areas. Take a look at our editorial direction, mission statement and writer's guidelines below. Then email us. We accept queries as well as unsolicited manuscripts via email only. We also accept book excerpts.

Mission statement
Hockey Player® is devoted to helping serious hockey players and coaches get the most out of every game and practice. This is accomplished through a unique combination of instructional articles, interviews with some of the game's most talented players, and equipment-oriented articles and buyer's guides.

Editorial direction
Our primary mission is to provide playing tips, equipment news, training techniques, team drills and buyer's guides. Hockey Player® includes instructional columns for forwards, defensemen, goalies, etc., appealing to ice, roller and street hockey players. Readers also learn how to improve their skills through articles and interviews with top players and coaches. Hockey Player® is written by and for those who play.

Departments and areas on the site cover a wide spectrum of subjects of interest to players and parents. Chalk Talk consists of a play or drill explained as an easy-to-understand diagram or step-by-step photo essay. Center Ice is an interview with an NHL pro touching on everything from playing tips to youth hockey memories to Stanley Cup highlights.

New Products is where Hockey Player® showcases new equipment. Buyer's Guide gives our readers shopping advice, how-to information and a "Battle of the Brands" comparison chart on specific equipment. Other areas of the Hockey Player® site offer something for everyone. At Forward, On Defense, In Goal, Power Skating, Roller Hockey and Behind the Bench provide practical playing and workout tips.

Style guidelines
Following are a few important style and grammar tips for any submissions. Use the spell check on your word processor, use your dictionary. Spelling errors remain common, but are largely unnecessary these days. Most important: check and double-check the spelling of all names.

While sports journalism is not generally an area in which issues of structure are considered critical, we are nonetheless communicators. As such, it is important that our ideas be presented clearly, consisely and coherently-both to the novice reader/player and to the experienced one.

Therefore, the following reference books should be considered critical to all Hockey Player® writers: The Elements of Style, by Strunk and White (Macmillan), and A Short Handbook and Style Sheet, by Thomas Pinney (Harcourt).

Almost all questions of style and usage can be answered within these two brief, inexpensive, well-indexed volumes. They will serve you well in all your writing endeavors-and following their guidelines will certainly ingratiate you to the editors of Hockey Player®.

Following is an ever-evolving style sheet covering several issues unique to our subject matter.

• Always strive to write and quote in the present tense. While some situations-recalling past events, for example-will require past tense usage, "King says" is almost always preferable to "King said."
  
  
• Try and avoid awkward possessive constructions. It is correct to say "Rangers right wing Alexei Kovalev," without an apostrophe after the "s" in Rangers. If you feel a possessive reference is absolutely required, try and use the city name ("New York's") if that will avoid a hanging apostrophe. This will not be possible in all cases, but do your best.
  
  
• States: We use two-letter postal abbreviations whenever possible, and we omit periods. For example, Massachusetts is "MA" (not "Mass.") and New Jersey is "NJ" (not "N.J.").
  
  
• Groups, Leagues, Countries: We use standard abbreviations and seek to avoid periods. Preferred contractions are; US, USA, RHI, NHLPA. Not preferred; U.S., U.S.A., R.H.I., N.H.L.P.A.
  
  
• Titles: Abbreviations of titles should be in caps and, as above, free of periods. Vice President is abbreviated VP, not v.p. General Manager is abbreviated GM, not g.m.
  
  
• Hockey Words Terms: As they should appear...
  
  inline [no hyphen], Junior hockey [i.e. CHL, capitalized]
  blueline1994/95 [slash = a season], red line, 1993-96 [hypen = "through"]
  goal line, 6'2" [not 6-foot-2], goal post, bodycheck, goal crease, pokecheck
  stickhandler, stickhandlingoffseason, preseason, postseason, puck handling
  all-star, All-Star game, power play, faceoff [no hyphen], offside, offsides