Ice Hockey in Russia

Ice Hockey In Russia

The Russian men's national ice hockey team is the national ice hockey team of Russia, and are controlled by the Ice Hockey Federation of Russia. They are currently rated number one in the IIHF World Rankings; with 3980 points. The team has been competing internationally since 1993, and is recognized by the IIHF as the successor to the Soviet Union Hockey Federation and have passed its ranking on to Russia. Today, it still follows a long tradition of Soviet hockey team, composed mostly of Russian players. The Russian team replaced the Unified Team of the ice hockey at the 1992 Winter Olympics and the Commonwealth of Independent States team of the 1992 World Championships.

The Soviets were the most dominant teams of all time in international play. The team won nearly every world championship and Olympic tournament between 1954 and 1991 held by the International Ice Hockey Federation. As Russia has won the 2008, 2009 and 2012 World Ice Hockey Championships, and excelled at a very high level, they are currently ranked 1st in the IIHF World Rankings for the past 4 years. Russia has a total of 63580 players, about 0.05% of its population. As of June 2011, their head coach is Zinetula Bilyaletdinov.

The top three nominees for the 2009 Hart Memorial Trophy (the most valuable player award in the National Hockey League) all play for the Russian team: Alexander Ovechkin, Pavel Datsyuk, and Evgeni Malkin