IIHF World Ranking

World Ranking 2007

The IIHF World Ranking is a tool to reflect the long-term quality of the countries' national team programme. The IIHF World Ranking is based on awarding points for the final positions in the last four IIHF World Championships and in the last Olympic Ice Hockey Tournament. The 2007 IIHF World Ranking is thus based on the performance at the 2007, 2006, 2005, and the 2004 World Championship and at the 2006 Olympic Ice Hockey Tournament in Turin.

The team that wins the IIHF World Championship gold medal or the Olympic gold medal receives 1200 points. In general, there is a 20-point interval between two ranked positions (for example, 880 points for the 13th place and 860 points for the 14th place). As an exception to this principle there is a 40-point interval between gold and silver, silver and bronze, the 4th and 5th position and between the 8th and 9th position in the top division. The reason for the larger intervals for these positions is to give teams a bonus for reaching the quarter-finals, the semi-finals, the final and for winning the gold medal. (The bonus formula can be changed with any alterations to the playing format).

To enable the ranking to accurately reflect current form, the greatest importance is given to results of the last year's competition. To a lesser degree, attention is also paid to results from previous years. The system uses a four-year cycle as the points earned in one year decline linearly within the next 3 years and in the 5th year results are dropped from the calculation altogether.

Example: Value of the gold medal
Year 1: 100% value -- 1200 points
Year 2: 75% value -- 900 points
Year 3: 50% value -- 600 points
Year 4: 25% value -- 300 points
Year 5: 0% value -- 0 points

The IIHF World Ranking will be released following each IIHF World Championship and the Olympic Ice Hockey Tournament.

Before each World Championship, a pre-championship report will be released, in which the values of the previous seasons are already reduced according to the above-described procedure and where only the points of the upcoming competition need to be added to get the IIHF World Ranking for the year.

 

2007 Men's World Ranking

    Points Movement
1 Sweden 3740  
2 Canada 3670 +1
3 Finland 3640 +1
4 Czech Republic 3595 -2
5 Russia 3535  
6 Slovakia 3390  
7 USA 3375  
8 Switzerland 3250  
9 Belarus 3025 +1
10 Latvia 2995 -1
11 Germany 2925 +1
12 Denmark 2855 +2
13 Italy 2815 +4
14 Norway 2780 +1
15 Ukraine 2740 -2
16 Kazakhstan 2740 -5
17 Austria 2695 -1
18 Slovenia 2640  
19 France 2525  
20 Poland 2395  
21 Hungary 2320 +1
22 Japan 2305 -1
23 Estonia 2165 +1
24 Netherlands 2155 -1
25 Lithuania 2105  
26 Romania 1970  
27 China 1860 +1
28 Croatia 1850 -1
29 Great Britain 1605 +2
30 Serbia 1555 -1
31 Bulgaria 1500 -1
32 Korea 1320  
33 Australia 1260 +1
34 Israel 1260 -1
35 Belgium 1200  
36 Spain 1090 +1
37 Iceland 920 +3
38 Mexico 915 +1
39 New Zealand 900 -1
40 Turkey 830 +2
41 South Africa 770  
42 Luxembourg 710 +1
43 Ireland 710 +1
44 DPR Korea 660 -8
45 Armenia 390  
46 Mongolia 260 new