Mens and Womens World Hockey Championships

World Hockey Main Page Mens and Womens World Hockey Championship Past Winners Mens and Womens Olympic Games Past Hockey Champions World Junior Tournament Winners World Cup of Hockey (Canada Cup)

Mens World Hockey Championships

The Mens World Hockey Championship tournament has been played regularly since 1930. The International Ice Hockey Federation (IIHF), which governs both the World and Winter Olympic tournaments, considers the Olympic champions from 1920-68 to also be the World champions. However the IIHF has not recognized an Olympic champion as World champion since 1968. The IIHF has sanctioned separate World Championships in Olympic years three times–in 1972, 1976 and again in 1992. The world championship is officially vacant for the three Olympic years 1980, 84, 88. As this tournament takes place during the same period as the later stages of the NHL's Stanley Cup playoffs, many of that league's top players are not available to participate for their national teams or have only become available after their NHL teams have been eliminated. The current format is 16 teams in the championship group, that play a preliminary round, then the top eight teams play in the playoff medal round.

Mens World Hockey Championship Past Winners