Enjoying International Hockey Competitions

The International Ice Hockey Federation organizes the annual Ice Hockey World Championships. During the early years of the competition, Canadian teams dominated the rink. With increasing competition from other national teams following World War II, the Soviet Union, Czechoslovakia, and Sweden became a larger force, beginning to successfully compete and win medals.

* Because of varying standards about what constitutes amateur status, by 1954 European and Soviet Union teams were winning the competition as amateur status players while American and Canadian minor league players were not allowed to play as amateurs. This was seen as discriminatory against the Canadian players and resulted in a rule change in 1970 which allowed participation by professional players.

Unfortunately, the competitions were held at the same time as the Stanley Cup playoffs, so the top players were unable to attend the championships. When the rule change was rescinded, Canada boycotted the World Championships for a period of seven years. Not until 1977 were professional players allowed on all teams. However, other teams had improved significantly in the years that Canada was not a major force in ice hockey and there was a gap of 33 years before Canadians again took the first place in playoffs.

* With the breakup of the Soviet Union and the close of Cold War hostilities, the Soviet dominance of the sport ended. At the same time some of the national teams that were allowed into competition were seen to be as qualified as the existing Class A teams and quickly moved into the championship A list again.

* Currently, the World Championship consists of a main group plus 2 and sometimes 3 Divisions consisting of sixteen teams in the main group, twelve teams in Division I and twelve teams in Division II. Additional teams above these forty play in Division III. During the preliminary competition a system of round robin games reduces the number of entrants in the qualifying round to 12 teams from 16. The qualifying round of games establishes the top 8 teams. Four teams play in the semi finals and proceed to the gold medal game. The losing teams in the preliminary round play a relegation round and drop out of the main group in the future competition

* Winners of Division I rounds move to the Championship level. Winners of Division II competition will move to Division II. In each Division, the loser drops back to the next lower Division. There are no relegations from Division III. The only exception to this tournament format has been Japan. The Japanese team played at championship level and was not relegated for a number of years in hopes of promoting interest in the sport in the Far East. Japan now plays in Division I.

The next Championship is scheduled for April and May of 2009 and will be played in Zurich, Switzerland. This is the 73rd World Championship series. World Championship teams for the 2009 championships include Canada, United States, Slovakia, Belarus, Hungary, Switzerland, Russia, Germany, France, Sweden, Latvia, Austria, Finland, Czech Republic, Norway and Denmark.

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James Brown writes about The Sports Authority online coupons, Football Fanatics online coupons and FansEdge.com online coupons

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