Vigilance posted:

Other times teams will cycle the puck and it will be confusing because it looks like they don't even care about generating a shot but the cycle is all designed to get the other team's defenses moving and hopefully to cause a player on the other team to make a mistake and miss coverage, which will lead to a passing lane opening up and/or a shooting lane opening up for the offensive team. The one caveat to cycling is that hockey teams often have defensive lines as well. Usually these are the third and fourth lines on a hockey team. These players will cycle the puck but sometimes will be more concerned with simply maintaining possession of the puck than creating a scoring opportunity, as these lines are not focused on scoring goals as they generally lack the offensive skill and creativity to do so. Their goal is simply to prevent their own team from getting scored on, and possessing the puck for long periods helps them do that.