Key takeaways
- In a regular-season game tied after 60 minutes, both teams have already earned a point; overtime and the shootout decide only who gets the second one.
- Overtime is played with each team defending the end it defended in the second period, so in an arena with both benches on one side, every change is a long one.
- Pulling the goaltender in regular-season overtime risks the point already banked: a team that loses while its goalie is off the ice forfeits it, unless he was pulled on a delayed penalty.
- A penalty in three-on-three overtime adds a skater for the other team rather than removing one, so a minor turns the game into four-on-three.
- Playoff overtime has no shootout and no three-on-three: teams play full 20-minute periods until someone scores.
When a regular-season NHL game is tied after 60 minutes, each team gets a point and they play five minutes of sudden-death overtime at three skaters a side; if nobody scores, a shootout decides the extra point. The playoffs work completely differently: no three-on-three, no shootout, just full 20-minute periods until somebody scores.
Everything here is from Rule 84 of the NHL's 2026-27 rulebook, with a few supporting rules noted along the way.
The regular season, step by step
What happens between the end of the third period and the final result:
- Both teams bank a point. The rule awards one point in the standings to each team the moment regulation ends level.
- The ice is shovelled, not resurfaced. Arena crews clear the whole surface using their television time-out routine. No intermission time goes on the clock; the league expects overtime to start about two minutes after regulation. Players wait at their benches and may not go to the dressing room.
- Teams change ends. For the whole of overtime, each team defends the same end it defended in the second period.
- Five minutes, three on three. Each team plays three skaters and a goaltender. The first goal ends the game and earns the scoring team its second point.
- If it is still tied, a shootout. The ice is shovelled again and the shootout decides the extra point.
The scoring logic is worth stating plainly: a regulation win is worth two points and a regulation loss nothing, but a game that reaches overtime puts three points into the standings — two for the winner, one for the loser.
Why three-on-three plays so differently
Take four skaters off the ice and the rink becomes enormous. With six skaters in total instead of ten, a single lost puck can quickly become an odd-man rush the other way, and a team that keeps possession can wait for an opening rather than force one.
The choice of ends adds to it. When a rink's two benches are on the same side, Rule 86.3 has the home team start the game defending the goal nearest its own bench. In the second period — and in overtime, which copies the second period — each team is defending the goal at the far end from its bench. Every line change means a longer trip, and a tired three-man unit stuck in its own end has a long way to go to get fresh legs on.
Penalties in overtime
A penalty normally removes a skater from the offending team. At three-on-three there is nobody to spare, so the rule adds one to the other team instead.
| Situation | On-ice strength |
|---|---|
| One team takes a minor in overtime | 4 skaters against 3 |
| Both teams take minors at the same stoppage, nothing else on the clock | Stays 3 on 3 |
| A two-man advantage in overtime | Offending team keeps 3; the other team gets 5 |
| Regulation ends with a power play still running | Overtime starts 4 on 3 |
| Regulation ends 4 on 4 | Overtime starts 3 on 3 |
| Regulation ends 5 on 3 | Overtime starts 5 on 3, adjusted at stoppages as penalties expire |
Two principles sit behind the table: a team never has fewer than three skaters, and when penalties expire during continuous play, the officials restore the correct overtime strength at the next stoppage.
Pulling the goalie in overtime
A team may pull its goaltender for an extra attacker in regular-season overtime — but the rulebook attaches a price. If it loses the game while the goalie is off the ice, it forfeits the point it earned at the end of regulation. The one exception is a goalie pulled because the referee has signalled a delayed penalty against the other team.
The rule also stops a goalie sneaking back: once he has gone to the bench for an extra attacker in overtime, he must wait for a stoppage to return, and changing on the fly brings a bench minor for an ineligible player.
That makes the decision very different from pulling the goalie late in regulation. In the third period, a trailing team has nothing to lose but the game. In overtime, a tied team has a point in hand, and risking it for a chance at the second is rarely the same bargain. The research behind the regulation version of the decision is a separate subject; hockey goaltending explained covers the position itself.
The shootout
If overtime ends without a goal, the ice is shovelled again and the shootout begins. Its rules borrow from the penalty shot:
- Three rounds, then sudden death. Each team gets three shots unless the result is settled earlier; after that, the shootout continues one shooter at a time until one team scores and the other does not.
- The home team chooses whether to shoot first or second. Goaltenders defend the goal nearest their own bench.
- Order is the coach's call, but nobody shoots twice until every eligible teammate has shot. Players serving a ten-minute misconduct, or ejected with a game misconduct or match penalty, are not eligible.
- The goalie stays in once the shootout starts, unless he is injured.
- Each attempt follows the penalty-shot rule: the shooter starts at centre ice, keeps the puck moving towards the goal, and gets no rebounds. The spin-o-rama is banned.
The scoring is unusual. However many goals are scored in the shootout, the final score gives the winning team one more goal than its opponent. The losing goalie is not charged with that goal, and the player who scores the deciding shootout goal is not credited with a goal in his personal statistics. A team that refuses to take part is given a shootout loss.
Playoff overtime
The playoffs remove everything that makes regular-season overtime distinctive. After regulation, the teams take a 15-minute intermission and then play 20-minute periods, changing ends for each overtime period, until somebody scores. There is no three-on-three, no shootout and no point for losing.
There is one housekeeping rule fans notice: at the first stoppage at or after the 10:00 mark of each playoff overtime period, the crew does the same snow removal it does during a commercial time-out, so a long playoff game is not played on ever-worsening ice.
How the format got here
Overtime has not always looked like this. Ties used to be a normal result: Pittsburgh's record 17-game winning streak in 1993 ended with a 6-6 tie at New Jersey on the last day of that regular season. Today's rulebook has no ties at all, because every regular-season game still level after overtime goes to a shootout.
The number of skaters has changed too. When Beaudoin and Swartz built a game simulator from the league's 2007-08 season, they described regular-season overtime as five minutes of four-on-four, followed by a three-round shootout, with one point for the team that lost after regulation. Treat that as a snapshot of the format in their data rather than a date for any rule change; the 2026-27 rulebook sets three-on-three.
What it means for a coach or a GM
A few practical consequences follow from the rules alone:
- The second point is the only thing at stake in overtime. That is why the extra-attacker gamble that makes sense in regulation looks much worse in overtime.
- Shootout depth matters in long shootouts. Because nobody shoots twice until everyone eligible has, a long sudden-death round eventually reaches every eligible skater on the bench.
- Penalties are punished harder. A minor in three-on-three overtime creates four-against-three at the very moment the game is being decided. Power play and penalty kill explained covers why one extra skater matters so much.
Overtime in our games
In Hockey Career Sim 2026 you play one skater or goalie through seasons of schedules, standings and playoffs in a fictional league, making the calls — shoot, pass, defend, challenge the puck carrier, protect the net — at the points of a game where they matter. The Hockey Career Sim 2026 guide covers building that player. The draft side of the sport, where you assemble a starting six and a coach and get a projected 84-game record back, is covered in the hockey draft simulator guide for 84-0 Hockey Draft & GM Manager; its pool is built from real players' careers, rated by the game itself, and its projection is the game's own model rather than a forecast. Neither title is affiliated with the league. Our other hockey rules explainers are on the hockey hub, and the catalogue is under sports career and GM games.
Good to know
Frequently asked questions
How does NHL overtime work in the regular season?
How does the NHL shootout work?
How is NHL playoff overtime different?
What happens if a penalty is called in overtime?
Can a team pull its goalie in overtime?
Sources
- National Hockey League Official Rules 2026-2027 (Rule 84 Overtime; Rules 1.10, 24, 78.1, 86.3; Tables 15-16) (opens in a new tab)National Hockey League — accessed
- Tocchet hopes Oilers don't break Penguins' NHL record 17-game win streak (opens in a new tab)NHL.com — accessed
- Strategies for Pulling the Goalie in Hockey (Beaudoin and Swartz) (opens in a new tab)Simon Fraser University, Department of Statistics and Actuarial Science — accessed
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