face-off

face off

1. verb To begin a competition or contest. If you make it to the finals, you'll have to face off against their best player.
2. verb To initiate a competition or contest between two people. In this usage, a noun or pronoun is used between "face" and "off." The referees will face you two off before the match begins.
3. verb In certain sports (like ice hockey), to begin play by dropping the ball or puck between two opponents. Send your best center out there to face off against theirs.
4. noun A conflict or confrontation. The phrase is typically hyphenated when used as a noun. A: "How long were those two in a face-off before the teacher got there?" B: "Long enough for Joey to give Pete a black eye!"
5. noun In hockey, when the puck is dropped between two opposing players to begin play, either at the start of the game or after a stoppage. The phrase is typically hyphenated when used as a noun. Our center won the face-off and passed the puck up the ice.
See also: face, off
Farlex Dictionary of Idioms.

face-off

n. a confrontation. (From hockey.) The face-off continued for a few moments till both of them realized that there was no point in fighting.
McGraw-Hill's Dictionary of American Slang and Colloquial Expressions
See also:
  • face off
  • biff
  • cross over
  • answer to
  • bag it
  • bag someone
  • bagged
  • bagging
  • going to
  • break out
References in periodicals archive
As in previous Face-Offs, this show was directed by veteran fashion director Jackie Aquino.
2019 'FACE-OFF': THE MASTERS WOWED, THE MILLENNIALS HELD THEIR GROUND
'However, I won't go outside the NIWA Act to take a stance on the face-off with LASWA.
I won't bend NIWA Act to settle LASWA rift - Mamora
"We want to get the Big Blue Tent thumping from the opening face-off."
Devils' owners make visit to Big Blue Tent
Any tickets remaining will be available on the door before face-off this evening.
Voth keeps his head to give impressive Devils the first-leg advantage
The Charleston face-off involved two of these systems.
EBSCO and serials solutions face off over search discovery
When the press conference was over and the two men staged the traditional face-off for the cameras, Hopkins, 43, repeatedly told undefeated super-middleweight champion Calzaghe: "You better be willing to die."
Hopkins vows to execute Calzaghe plan
If we knew our history, Zinn said, we wouldn't be fooled by a President who peddles fear, since that's what happened in the face-off against the Soviet Union, during Vietnam, and with Reagan's wars in Central America.
Laura doesn't count
A team with a dominating face-off man or goalie who has found his "zone" can alter the outcome of a game.
Free your offensive man
In time for Halloween mention is Carolyn Crimi's Boris And Bella (0152-025286, $15.00): telling of the messiest monster in Booville, Bella Legrossi, in a face-off with the tidiest vampire Boris Kleanitoff.
Harcourt
I take offense at the tagline on your cover: "Campus face-off: bisexuals vs.
Including bisexuals
As well as the likelihood of a MobyEminem face-off being limited, it looks like the rest of the pop fraternity will be well-behaved as the organisers have decided to ban alcohol at this year's ceremony.
Moby and Eminem square up for a bit of a Brits bashing
In much the same way that Whitehead's quirky debut announced him as an aggressively literary writer hoping to tackle "big" themes, Lavalle establishes a beachhead on what seems like the grotesque fringes, "the tribulations of 318-pound, potentially schizophrenic Cornell dropout Anthony," in order to literally worm his way back to the center of black life and literature, where imperfect families and individuals face-off against demons that manage to be personal, social, figurative and literal all at the same time.
The Ecstatic
After all, it is not every day that a 76-year-old constitutional monarch is called upon to take part in a face-off, albeit a ceremonial face-off.
Royal cool: Jubilee on ice
Friday 30 Aug 2002: Mulhouse v Sodertalje - Face-off: 17:00
Ice Hockey: A GIANT RESISTANCE; French and Vikings invade
In the following decades of the Cold War, the face-off of October 1962 remained the closest the world ever came to nuclear war.
Peace on the brink of war: after home bunkers and duck-and-cover drills, Americans were braced for war in the 1962 Cuban missile crisis. (times past)