
Canadian defender Dan Hamhuis today announced his retirement from pro hockey at the age of 37, following his Nashville Predators’ elimination from the NHL Stanley Cup Playoffs bubble in Edmonton.
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Category Archives: World Championship
🇨🇭 🇺🇸 IHLC Classics: Eisgenossen’s 60 Year Wait Is Over
From time to time, TheIHLC.com will feature detailed recaps and boxscores of some of the most legendary games in international hockey history, considered to be “IHLC Classics.” Today, in honour of Swiss National Day (also known as Schweizer Bundesfeiertag, Fête Nationale Suisse or Festa Nazionale Svizzera), we feature La Nati’s historic streak at the 2013 World Championship, namely their historic semifinal victory.

🇨🇭 Switzerland 3-0 United States 🇺🇸
World Championship Semifinal
Ericsson Globe, Stockholm 🇸🇪
Saturday, 18 May 2013
They did it. In a semi-final game featuring two teams challenging history, Switzerland defeated Team USA 3-0 to advance forward to their first opportunity for gold since 1935.
Whatever the outcome in the final game against Sweden will be, it will be the first World Championship medal for the Swiss in exactly 60 years.
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🇷🇺 Alexander Gusev: 1947-2020

Alexander Gusev, one of the key defensive backstops for the Soviet Red Army dynasty of the 1970’s that won Summit Series, Olympic and World Championship titles, passed away at the age of 73.
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🇷🇺 Ilya Nikulin Announces Career Is Over At Age 38

Russian defender Ilya Nikulin, who was a mainstay on the Russian blueline for nearly two decades, today confirmed his career is over after not having played since 2018-19, when he captained Dynamo Moscow of the KHL.
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🇺🇸 🇨🇦 IHLC Classics: America’s First (And So Far Only) Worlds Gold
From time to time, TheIHLC.com will feature detailed recaps and boxscores of some of the most legendary games in international hockey history, considered to be “IHLC Classics.” Today, in honour of Independence Day in the United States, we feature Team USA’s first (and so far only) World Championship title, all the way back from 1933.

🇺🇸 United States 2-1 Canada 🇨🇦 (OT)
World Championship Gold Medal Game
Zimní stadion Štvanice, Prague 🇨🇿
Sunday, 26 February 1933
In the early days of international hockey, Canada was all but invincible. It won the first four Olympic tournaments (1920, 1924, 1928, 1932) and the first two World Championships (1930 and 1931) without losing a single game.
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🇨🇦 🇫🇮 IHLC Classics: Canada’s Record Double Dozen
From time to time, TheIHLC.com will feature detailed recaps and boxscores of some of the most legendary games in international hockey history, considered to be “IHLC Classics.” Today, in honour of Canada Day, we feature Canada’s record 24th World Championship Gold Medal, which they captured over Finland in 2007.

🇨🇦 Canada 4-2 Finland 🇫🇮
World Championship Gold Medal Game
Arena Khodynka, Moscow 🇷🇺
Sunday, 13 May 2007
Here’s an incredible bit of trivia: By winning the 2007 IIHF World Championship, Canada earned its 24th gold medal, more than any other nation. Canada’s seven Olympic gold medals are also tops (tied with the Soviet Union).
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🇨🇦 🇸🇰 Hockey Hall Of Fame Announces Class Of 2020

The Hockey Hall Of Fame today announced the newest members that will join as the Class of 2020, with two first-ballot inductees joining a trio of Canadian players who have long awaited their call to the Hall in Toronto.
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2020 IIHF Extraordinary Congress Sets Future Calendar

With the scheduled 2020 IIHF Congress that was set for Zürich during the now-cancelled 2020 World Championships, today the International Ice Hockey Federation held their Extraordinary Congress virtually (due to the COVID-19 pandemic), setting the schedule for both the 2020-21 international hockey calendar, as well as for the 2022 Olympic qualification.
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🇨🇿 Martin Erat Retires From Kometa Brno At Age 38

Czech winger Martin Erat, who spent twenty years professionally in the NHL, KHL and Czech leagues, as well as representing the Narodnitym many times, today announced his retirement from his final club, HC Kometa Brno.
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🇷🇺 🇨🇦 IHLC Classics: The Red Army Stuns Canada…And The World
From time to time, TheIHLC.com will feature detailed recaps and boxscores of some of the most legendary games in international hockey history, considered to be “IHLC Classics.” Today, in honour of Russian National Day, we feature the Red Army’s first major international title, and their debut IHLC matchup, against Canada to finish the 1954 World Championship.

🇷🇺 Soviet Union 7-2 Canada 🇨🇦
World Championship Final Round
Stockholms Olympiastadion, Stockholm 🇸🇪
Sunday, 07 March 1954
There is no question that 1954 was the start of the modern era of international hockey. Prior to the World Championship in Stockholm, Sweden, that year, Canada ruled the ice lanes uncontested. Indeed, from 1920 to 1954, it lost only two significant games, one to the United States at the 1933 World Championship and one to Great Britain at the 1936 Olympics.
But in 1954, the Soviet Union made its first appearance in international hockey, and it did so in a blaze of glory. The Soviets had only started playing “Canadian hockey” (as opposed to European bandy) in 1946, and just eight years later that nation’s top players and managers believed they were ready to play against the world – and win.
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🇫🇮 Lasse Kukkonen Retires At 38 From Oulu Kärpät

Finnish defender Lasse Kukkonen, a mainstay of the Leijonat since 1999 that helped Finland to just its second World Championship in history in 2011, today announced his retirement from his hometown club, Oulu Kärpät, at age 38.
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🇸🇰 Ján Laco Announces Retirement At Age 38

Slovak goaltender Ján Laco, whose theatrics at the 2012 World Championship landed Slovakia a surprise Silver medal, today announced his retirement from pro hockey at the age of 38.
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🇬🇧 🇨🇦 IHLC Classics: Foster & Brenchley Shock The World
From time to time, TheIHLC.com will feature detailed recaps and boxscores of some of the most legendary games in international hockey history, considered to be “IHLC Classics.” To celebrate on what should have been the day of the 2020 World Championship Gold Medal final, instead we recap one of the biggest upsets in Olympic and World Championship history, the fall of Canada at the hands of Great Britain in 1936.

🇬🇧 Great Britain 2-1 Canada 🇨🇦
Olympic Second Round
Olympia-Kunsteis-Stadion, Garmisch-Partenkirchen 🇩🇪
Tuesday, 11 February 1936
It was an Olympics coated in sportive controversy and by the presence of Adolf Hitler, who used the global sports event as a propaganda tool, three years before the outbreak of the biggest catastrophe in the history of mankind.
In the end, history shows that Canada lost the Gold medal and Great Britain won. The process to that result, however, was anything but simple.
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🇨🇿 Aleš Hemský Announces Retirement At Age 36

Aleš Hemský, the workhorse Czech winger who spent 15 years in the National Hockey League, today announced his retirement from pro hockey at age 36, after a concussion prevented him from playing for the past three years.
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🇨🇦 Canada’s Boycott: 1970-77
With the now-cancelled 2020 World Championships set to have begun today in Switzerland, TheIHLC.com will instead highlight the last time there was a major lack of competition in the century-plus lineage of the IHLC – Canada’s international hockey boycott from 1970-77, and how the IHLC could have looked if just one fateful game in 1970 went another way.

On 04 January 1970, the creator of modern ice hockey and the most dominant team in the game up to that point, Canada, shocked the hockey world when it announced that effective immediately, it was withdrawing from all international competition, including the World Championships, Olympic Games and other exhibition games or tournaments.
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2020 IIHF Rankings, Olympic Seedings Released (UPDATED)

With the world on pause, and all international hockey cancelled, due to the ongoing COVID-19 pandemic, the IIHF today answered a few of many questions coming out of the cancellations of most major World Championship tournaments, today releasing both the 2020 Men’s and Women’s World Ranking, which in turn has officially confirmed the first qualifiers for the 2022 Beijing Olympics.
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🇷🇺 Andrei Markov Retires Following KHL Season Cancellation

Andrei Markov, the Russian workhorse defenceman who anchored top bluelines for over 20 seasons in both Canada and his native Russia, today announced his retirement from Lokomotiv Yaroslavl of the KHL at age 41, three weeks after the KHL season was suspended over COVID-19.
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🇸🇪 Tony Mårtensson Announces Retirement At Age 39

Tony Mårtensson, the Swedish winger whose 20 year pro career took him to the United States, Russia, Switzerland and his native Sweden, today announced his retirement from pro hockey at age 39.
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🇨🇭 Men’s Top Division World Championship Cancelled By IIHF

The final tournament on the International Ice Hockey Federation calendar, the last hope of any semblance of international hockey this season, today was officially cancelled, as the Top Division of the Men’s World Championship was officially cancelled over COVID-19 concerns.
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🇨🇿 Vladimír Zábrodský: 1923-2020

Vladimír Zábrodský, the Czech winger who propelled Czechoslovakia to their first World Championship Gold and Olympic Silver in history, passed away today in Stockholm at the age of 97.
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