Any sport that is competitive can go wild with a shitty parent, but hockey makes good parents awful.
It's a sport that is crazy expensive to play. Parents are literally remortgaging their homes to pay for ice time etc. Because ice time is so expensive the entire family is forced to practice at insane hours, literally 5 am on a saturday and so on just to save a few dollars. Competitive play in Canada usually involves road trips that requires hotels and all that. And the culture is very elitist where a 9 year old kid is required to have a full suit to walk into the arena. So many families are insanely stressed, including not just the athlete and their parents, but often the siblings/grand parents whoever.
It requires learning complex skills at a very early age. You won't get anywhere if your kid hasn't in relative terms mastered skating and stick handling by age 10. This requires pushing your kid endlessly on tasks that aren't near as fun as shooting hoops or throwing a ball.
Because the parents are constantly carting their kids around to the many practices and games and spending so much money they feel entitled. Their kid basically "owes them" for the rest of their lives. This means kids are afraid to tell their parents they want to stop playing, so you have unmotivated kids who require being screamed at to move.
Because the sport is so skilled, a below average kid can look light years ahead, compare with parents who are less aggressive in pushing their kids. This inflates their parents into thinking their kids are way way way better than they actually are, and that it's all because they are "pushing them".
Then the kid gets into age where fighting and slamming someone into the boards is actually allowed. All of a sudden the parent sees their kid being exposed for their subpar speed, durability and strength. The natural move of course is teaching their kid to be as dirty and aggressive as they can. Which means the good parents with skilled kids, are watching the refs turn a blind eye as their kid becomes a victim of dirty hits. So even the good parents turn to toxic shit, after they drive little Gord to the emerge with a broken jaw.
