A (True) World Cup of Hockey

As first mentioned by Friedman last week, there is the idea of the World Cup of hockey coming back. While the big issue seems to be when to schedule it (I'll get to that later on), what interest me is what countries get involved. The NHL (who would run the World Cup) do not have any international ranking, so they will either be going by the IIHF or base it off what countries have the most NHLers. Both options are good, but it bugs me seeing that World = Canada, USA, and a couple European countries. If there was going to be a World Cup then I want to see an actual World Cup. Here is what I plan:

Seeding	Teams
1	World Rank #1 (Russia)
2	World Rank #2 (Finland)
3	World Rank #3 (Czech Republic)
4	World Rank #4 (Sweden)
5	World Rank #5 (Canada)
6	World Rank #6 (Slovakia)
7	World Rank #7 (USA)
8	European Qualifier 1
9	European Qualifier 2
10	European Qualifier 3
11	European Qualifier 4
12	European Qualifier 5
13	European Qualifier 6
14	Asian Qualifier 1
15	Rest of World Qualifier 1
16	Asian/Rest of World Qualifier 2

The first seven spots are based off of the IIHF rankings. European countries are guaranteed six spots, Asian and Rest of World countries get guaranteed spot plus another one to qualify for.

Qualifying Teams

Seeding	Rest of World
1	Australia
2	Mexico
3	New Zealand
4	South Africa

Seeding	Asian Group (Master)
1	Kazakhstan
2	Japan
3	South Korea
4	China
5	Israel
6	North Korea
7	Mongolia
8	United Arab Emirates

Seeding	European Group (Master)
1	Norway
2	Switzerland
3	Germany
4	Latvia
5	Denmark
6	Belarus
7	France
8	Austria
9	Italy
10	Slovenia
11	Hungary
12	Ukraine
13	Great Britain
14	Poland
15	Netherlands
16	Lithuania
17	Estonia
18	Romania
19	Spain
20	Croatia
21	Serbia
22	Bulgaria
23	Iceland
24	Belgium
25	Turkey
26	Ireland
27	Luxembourg
28	Greece
29	Armenia
30	Georgia

A few things to note:

• All the countries (minus two) are seeded in their group according to the most recent IIHF ranking.
• Armenia and Georgia (the two unranked countries) are in because they have participated in an IIHF event.
• Speaking of Armenia, I'm assuming that they can put a team together. Their hockey operations has been shut down for a while.
• They are still a few years away, but I like for Argentina to the ROW group if they can translate from Roller Hockey to ice.

So the countries are set, now for the groups. The Rest of World group is already set, but the Asian and Europe groups need trimming down. Using FIFA's model for drawing teams, I put teams in "pots" based on seeding. Europe pots are seeds 1-6, 7-12, 13-18, 19-24, 25-30, Asian seeds are 1-4 and 5-8. The Asian draw is modified so two teams per pot end up in the same group, instead of separating by rank (meaning 1,4,5,8 in one group, 2,3,6,7 in the other).

Asian Draw:

Seeding	Asian Group #1
1	Japan
2	China
3	Israel
4	United Arab Emirates

 

Seeding	Asian Group #2
1	Kazakhstan
2	South Korea
3	North Korea
4	Mongolia

European Draw:

Seeding	European Group #1
1	Switzerland
2	Austria
3	Lithuania
4	Iceland
5	Georgia

 

Seeding	European Group #2
1	Latvia
2	Hungary
3	Great Britain
4	Serbia
5	Greece

 

Seeding	European Group #3
1	Denmark
2	Slovenia
3	Romania
4	Spain
5	Ireland

Seeding	European Group #4
1	Belarus
2	France
3	Poland
4	Bulgaria
5	Armenia

 

Seeding	European Group #5
1	Norway
2	Ukraine
3	Netherlands
4	Belgium
5	Luxembourg

Seeding	European Group #6
1	Germany
2	Italy
3	Estonia
4	Croatia
5	Turkey

The winner in each European Group gets to go straight to the main tournament. The top two in both Asian Groups will move on to another qualifying group. The Rest of World Group winner would move on while the second place team is put in with the Asian teams second qualifier. Based on current rankings, here is what that group would look like:

Seeding	Asian/Rest Of World Group
1	Kazakhstan
2	Japan
3	South Korea
4	Mexico
5	China

The top two teams from this group then move on to the main tournament.

Quick Note: If Canada or the USA fall out of the top 7, then changes will be made. More than likely, the one who falls out will go the the Rest of World Group, Australia moves to the Asian Group (again, like FIFA), and Kazakhstan moves to the European Group.

Qualifying Schedule

International Break	Qualifying Games
1 (Late August-Early September)	European Groups, Asian Groups, Rest of World Group
2 (Early November)	Asian Groups, Rest of World Group
3 (Mid-December)	Asian/Rest of World Group
4 (Early February)	European Groups,  Asian/Rest of World Group

I based this off of a year of qualifying (ideally I want two years but one is good enough). The IIHF has four international breaks. I have the European Group qualifications happening at breaks one and four since breaks two and three are when European countries hold their own tournaments (Deutscheland Cup for example). Since countries in the Asian and Rest of World groups don't participate in tournaments, they can play during all four breaks. The schedule is set up so every team plays the same opponent twice. Before qualification, each group will select two countries to be a host of a qualifying round.

Final Tournament

Based on ranking and group, here is what the World Cup would look like:

Seeding	World Cup Tournament
1	Russia
2	Finland
3	Czech Republic
4	Sweden
5	Canada
6	Slovakia
7	USA
8	Switzerland
9	Latvia
10	Denmark
11	Belarus
12	Norway
13	Germany
14	Kazakhstan
15	Australia
16	Japan

Again, using FIFA's pot system to determine groups:

Seeding	Group #1
1	Czech Republic
2	USA
3	Denmark
4	Australia

 

Seeding	Group #2
1	Sweden
2	Canada
3	Latvia
4	Japan

 

Seeding	Group #3
1	Finland
2	Slovakia
3	Norway
4	Kazakhstan

 

Seeding	Group #4
1	Russia
2	Switzerland
3	Belarus
4	Germany

The top two teams from each group move on to the playoffs.

World Cup Schedule

As Friedman pointed out (link above), when the tournament will happen is up for debate. Greg Wyshynski (Puck Daddy) argues for a February tournament. I have an issue with this, and not just from an NHL-shutting-down-the-season point of view.

Stepping aside from my 16-team format and reverting back to the 8-team format, the tournament will take two weeks to complete. The February international break (and all other for that matter) only go for a week, so there will need to be coordination between the participating Hockey Federations. And the NHL season is not the only season that will be disrupted by a February tournament. I would guess that a lot of other leagues (especially the KHL) will not like this tournament being in February since it would be close to the playoffs - European leagues are usually done by early April, giving time for World Championship training camps. A September tournament would be beneficial since it could act like a training camp for NHL players and it would not disrupt the European leagues as much since they would just be starting.

Back to the 16-team format. Each team faces the team in there group once, with the top two advancing to the Quarter Finals. Assuming there is two host cities (Toronto and Montreal), this is how the schedule would play out:

Date	Games
September 1	Group A, Group B
September 2	Group C, Group D
September 3	Group A, Group B
September 4	Group C, Group D
September 5	Group A, Group B
September 6	Group C, Group D
September 8	Quarter Finals
September 10	Semi-Finals
September 12	Bronze Medal
September 13	Gold Medal

The Bronze and Gold Medal games could be played the same day. I just like the idea of separating them.

Overall, the idea is to get all hockey-playing countries involved. Obviously, this isn't going to happen (did I mention Armenia's suspended program?). The most to come out of this is the schedule - You're Welcome NHL.