The International Ice Hockey Federation (IIHF) has published the 2020 IIHF Men’s & Women’s World Rankings on Friday. The annual ranking is based on the results in the World Championships and Olympic Winter Games (including Olympic Qualification) of the last four years and the 2020 edition is used for the seeding of the 2022 Olympic Winter Games.

The 2020 rankings include points from the 2020 IIHF Ice Hockey World Championship program in the men’s senior and women’s senior category. For tournaments that were not played due to the coronavirus pandemic, the points will be given according to the seeding position as foreseen in the IIHF Sport Regulations.

2020 IIHF Men’s World Ranking

Due to the lack of tournaments there has been few movements in the 54-country ranking. The top-10 remain the same and are led by Canada followed by Russia, Finland and Sweden.

Click here for the full ranking.

The new World Ranking also determines the seeding of the Olympic men’s ice hockey tournament in Beijing 2022:

Group A: Canada (1), USA (6), Germany (7), China (12).
Group B: Russia (2), Czech Republic (5), Switzerland (8), Qualifier 3 (11).
Group C: Finland (3), Sweden (4), Qualifier 1 (9), Qualifier 2 (10).

The Olympic Qualification for the men’s teams has already started in November 2019 and will end with the Final Olympic Qualification scheduled for 27-30 August 2020 in the following groups:

Group D: Slovakia, Belarus, Austria, Poland. In Bratislava, Slovakia.
Group E: Latvia, France, Italy, Hungary. In Riga, Latvia.
Group F: Norway, Denmark, Korea, Slovenia. In Norway (city TBA).

2020 IIHF Women’s World Ranking

With only two tournaments played this season, the 2020 IIHF Women’s World Ranking also didn’t change much. The top-6 countries remained in the same order and will be the ones directly qualified for the Olympic women’s ice hockey tournament in Beijing 2022, which will be played in two tiered groups:

Group A: USA (1), Canada (2), Finland (3), Russia (4), Switzerland (5).
Group B: Japan (6), Qualifier 1 (7), Qualifier 2 (8), Qualifier 3 (9), China (10).

Click here for the full ranking.

The ranking will also determine the seeding for the women’s Olympic Qualification. The structure will depend on the number of national teams entered for Olympic women’s ice hockey.

The rights to host an Olympic Qualification group are given according to the seeding (World Ranking position), which means that the teams ranked 7th to 9th – Czech Republic, Germany and Sweden – would have the right to host their Final Olympic Qualification group. The planned dates are 11-14 February 2021.

More details on the Olympic Qualification in women’s ice hockey will be announced later once the teams are entered.

Note: The allocation of events for the 2021 IIHF Ice Hockey World Championship program as well as the seedings, groups and hosts will be clarified by the next IIHF Congress and then be published on IIHF.com.