Why scoring three times is called a hat-trick, and how cricket started it
In 1858 the bowler H. H. Stephenson took three wickets with three consecutive balls, and delighted spectators passed round a collection to buy him a hat. That gift gave sport one of its most borrowed words, now shouted for goals, tries, touchdowns and even rounds of Counter-Strike.
The phrase first turned up in print in 1865, in the Chelmsford Chronicle. In cricket it still means one bowler dismissing batters with successive deliveries in a single match. Other games took the idea and loosened it to any three scores in a game, from hockey and water polo to Formula 1 and rugby, where three tries earns the label.
Football supplies the most famous examples. The first in an international came from Scotland's John McDougall against England on 2 March 1878, and Bert Patenaude of the United States scored the first at a World Cup, against Paraguay in 1930. Only three players have done it in a World Cup final: Geoff Hurst in 1966, Carli Lloyd in the 2015 women's final and Kylian Mbappé in 2022. Fans have refined the idea into the perfect version, with one goal off each foot and a header, while German speakers prize the flawless kind, three in a row within a half. Traditionally the scorer takes home the match ball.
Hats themselves returned in ice hockey. In 1946 the Biltmore Hat Company of Guelph sponsored a junior side, the Mad Hatters, and any player scoring three got a new fedora while fans threw hats on the ice. The custom spread through the NHL, whose first three-goal game came on 18 December 1917 from Harry Hyland of the Montreal Wanderers. Wayne Gretzky managed 50 in his career. Baseball fans in Toronto borrowed the ritual in 2015 when Edwin Encarnación hit his third home run of a game.
Some records stretch the word to breaking point. Alex Torr needed just 70 seconds for three goals in a 2013 Sunday league match, and Valentine Holmes ran in six tries against Fiji at the 2017 Rugby League World Cup, a double hat-trick.
Source: Hat-trick
