The 2014 IIHF World Ice Hockey Championship Results (Part Five)

Welcome to the fifth post of a miniseries of posts I am going to make about the 2014 IIHF World Ice Hockey Championship tournament. Most people don't realize that this tournament isn't just sixteen teams competing to win the gold medal. There are dozens of countries in various divisions competing to rise up the ladder of international ice hockey. In this, the 78th edition of the IIHF tournament, there are actually 46 teams trying to improve their international ranking and someday grab the gold medal.

Links for Part One, Two, Three, and Four are right here, where I painstakingly checked out Division III, Division II B, Division II A, and Division I B respectively.

Yesterday's post covered the triumph of Poland in Division I B. Congrats to the Poles for moving one step closer to joining the championship tournament. Next year, they'll compete in today's subject, Division I A, and attempt the leap into the top tier. While one team rises, one must fall, so Romania will sink into Division II A and attempt to move back up next year.

Speaking of Division I A, that would be our subject today. The second tier of the IIHF tournament ladder features six teams similarly to the preceding Division II, but there's more at stake than any other tournament. Winning in this tier means a shot at the gold medal in the IIHF World Championship tournament, the ultimate goal of the annual series of tournaments. Even more interesting is how two teams are promoted to the Top Division, while only one moves down. It's a tougher division to try to move up but plenty of the teams in the division now have bobbed up and down the bottom tiers in the last decade. The rising teams must compete against the likes of Canada, Russia, United States, Sweden, Finland, and all the other mainstays in the upper tier, which is quite the tall task. For this year, the Division I A tournament took place in Goyang, South Korea from April 20th to 26. Here are the final standings:

All charts courtesy of Wikipedia

Slovenia and Austria rise from the absolute dogfight that took place in this tier, while host South Korea were throttled in all five of their games and see demotion after being shut out of points. The difference-making games in this tier were Austria's overtime wins over Ukraine (3-2) and Hungary (5-4). Notable players in this tier's roster list were Austria's Michael Grabner (New York Islanders), Michael Raffl (Philadelphia Flyers), former Detroit Red Wing and the world's second most successful Slovenian player Jan Mursak, and his superior Anze Kopitar. Wait a minute...you must be asking yourself how Kopitar can be in two places at once. Great question! The NHLers I mentioned didn't actually play a single shift in the tournament. I can't say for sure what Grabner and Raffl were doing but Kopitar is a little busy winning playoff games in the NHL to play for his country. So this all begs the question.

Why the hell were these guys named to the team when there was no G-D way they were going to play?!?

Perhaps they thought the threat of Kopitar and Grabner was enough to have the other teams roll over. Looks like it all worked out anyway.

Here's the tournament's top scorers:

Good job, Thomas Koch, for winning the scoring race without scoring. Austria obviously dominated the scoring in this tournament, but kudos to seeing Kim Ki-sung of lowly South Korea get seven points in five brutal losses.

Here the top goaltenders:

Not exactly a goaltending duel in any of these games. Oh well, here's some actual footage via YouTube:





The Hungarian jerseys are awesome, and at one point a lot of Hungarians were reading this blog so here's a little something for them.

Tournament directorate named goaltender Yutaka Fukufuji of Japan (the first Japanese player to make the NHL), Austrian defenseman Dominique Heinrich, and forward Jan Muršak of Slovenia the best positional players. How does three points in five games get you the tournament's best forward? Maybe he killed every penalty or something. I don't know, I'm running out of steam for this tier.

Starting Monday I dig into the big tournament. You know, the one you all probably thought all these posts was about but I tricked you into reading five other posts first. See you then!

The Wiz Biz 2: A Few More Thoughts

This is an experimental column where I look at issues of the day and comment on them in a sentence or two. It's meant to be funny and somewhat insightful. I hope it lasts...

• HUGE game tonight in Boston as the Bruins face the Canadiens for the first time since the Max Pacioretty Incident. Mark Recchi's recent bout of verbal diarrhea has reopened the discussion about the legality of the hit, the credibility of Montreal's doctors, and of course most importantly, informed us all that Patches has a Twitter account. I'm not very good at predictions but I'm willing to take a shot in the dark here and say there might be a fight or two.
• According to a Brand Keys sports report, the most loyal fans in the NHL are...drumroll...the Detroit Red Wings. The top five are the Wings, the Philadelphia Flyers, the San Jose Sharks, the Vancouver Canucks, and the Boston Bruins. Huh, interesting, they're all Stanley Cup contenders. So who are the bottom five? In reverse order they are the Nashville Predators/Tampa Bay Lightning (how do you tie?), the Phoenix Coyotes, the New York Islanders, the Saint Louis Blues, and in last place, your Atlanta Thrashers. All teams with either financial issues, terrible attendance, or also rans for playoff contention. No surprises on this list. Oddly enough, the site doesn't list and quantifiable data...fishy, isn't it?
• Chris Osgood, the blog's namesake, is back on IR. Most Red Wings fans will admit to a degree of frustration with this story, as Ozzy was supposed to be back in nets almost two weeks ago. Well, it looks like he might not even make it back for playoff hockey, which means more Joey MacDonald. Luckily MacDonald has been playing uncharacteristically well with a 4-4-2 record and and impressive 2.10 GAA. Jimmy Howard is the man in Motown, but if he falters in the playoffs, Detroit is in trouble.
• Corey Perry for Hart? Not in my world, but the Ducks are 8-2 in their last 10 games and have creeped up on the Western conference playoff knuckleduster. Jonas Hiller is back, too. No one is going to want that match up in the first round. Even if Hiller is rusty in nets, journeyman Ray Emery seems to be picking up the slack just fine.
• Zack Parise might be back by the end of the year. Why bother? According to the amazing site Sports Club Stats, the New Jersey Devils have a 0.1 per cent chance of getting into the playoffs, with a maximum possible 90 point season, assuming they go undefeated in their final nine games. I can understand a player wanting to get back, but there's no reason to rush back just to make three or four token appearances.
• Finally, in international news, it's occurred to me that this blog has a small audience in the beautiful country of Hungary. Does Hungary like hockey? You bet they do. As of today Hungary is sitting in 20th place among all international ice hockey teams. They finished 2nd in Division I's Group B tournament in 2010 and are looking to win in Group A in 2011, where they will be co-hosting with Ukraine. A win at this tournament would boost them back up into the big tournament where perennial powerhouses like Canada, Sweden, Russia, and the United States play. Big props to goaltender Zoltán Hetényi of 2010's Hungarian squad for being the top goalie of Group B last tournament, registering two shutouts and giving up just two goals en route to Hungary's 4-1 record. He didn't win Goaltender of the Tournament for some reason...British netminder Stephen Murphy won with significantly worse numbers as Great Britain finished 4th in the group. So our boy Hetényi out duels him in a 2-0 shutout and doesn't get top goalie nod? Quite the rob job. In any event, GO HUNGARY!