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deke (n.)
< decoy
DCHP-3 (Apr 2025)
Spelling variants:deek, "deke"
n. — Hockey, Slang
a feigned shot or movement intended to draw a defending player out of position.
Type: 4. Culturally Significant — Hockey terms, such as deke, are culturally salient items in Canadian English. Above that, Charts 1 and 2 confirm the frequency of use of combinations with deke compared to non-Canadian internet domains. In Canada, deke almost exclusively is used in hockey contexts. The clipping of deke out of decoy is a mid-century innovation, carried over from hockey slang into print.
Quotations
1949
At the defense, he gave a deke that nearly shifted the only rearguard, Frankie Eddolls, out onto Eighth Avenue, and let go a 15-footer that beat Rayner.
1960
On the ice, Moore is one of the league's best players in the split-second art of faking a goalie out of position. "I've developed a little play of my own," he says. "It's a kind of fake shot - we call them 'deeks' for decoys."
1966
"I went in [on the goalie] but he wouldn't move. I gave one-two-three-four dekes. Finally on the fourth deke he moved and I fired her [the puck] into the corner."
1975
There are even some who witnessed the debacle who swear that time after time the ice was strewn with the athletic supporters of the KCVI team, such were the dekes the Blue Wings put on us.
2002
Game play is the most important difference in NHL 2003. "Dynamic deke control" allows a player to master stick handling for the first time ever in the NHL series. Scoring, deking and even just striding on your skates all feel very realistic.
Images
Chart 1: Internet Domain Search, 11 June 2024
