has skate contact with the red line at the instant the puck completely crosses it, the pass is legal regardless of where the puck actually makes contact with their stick. Both of their skates must be completely on the far side of the red line when the puck crosses the red line into the attacking zone to be governed by the aforementioned offside rule. This offside pass rule is not observed by all leagues. For instance, it was abolished by the IIHF, and its member countries' leagues (except the NHL) in 1998. The National Hockey League adopted the version used by the top minor leagues, under the terms of their 2005 Collective Bargaining Agreement, in which the centre line is no longer used to determine an offside pass. This was one of many rule changes intended to open up the game and improve scoring chances. History In the sport's earliest history, hockey was played similar to rugby, in which forward passing is not allowed. Also, hockey's offside infraction was influenced by the offside penalty from soccer. A legal pass could be made only to a teammate who is in an "onside" position behind the puck, thus forcing players to skate with the puck to move it forward. Therefore, a player cannot simply "stake out" in the offensive zone, receive a pass from a teammate in the neutral or defensive zones, then skate in and try to score on the opponent's goal. In the event of an offside pass, the play was stopped and a faceoff conducted from the point of the infraction, regardless of where it occurred. The first significant relaxation of this rule occurred in 1905, when the Ontario Hockey Association began to allow defensive players to play the puck within three feet of their goal if the puck rebounded off the goaltender. In some cases, a black line was painted onto the ice surface at that three foot mark, which served as an early precursor to the modern blue lines. Forward passing within the neutral and defensive zones was first allowed in the NHL in 1927, but after a season of extremely low scoring in 1928–29, the league first allowed forward passing in all zones. The result was immediate and dramatic as the number of goals scored per game more than doubled immediately. Under the NHL's new rule, there were no restrictions placed on where a player could