The great Canadian Boxing Day tradition of trying on your new set of pajamas and settling in to watch the International Ice Hockey Federation's U20 World Championship is in for a shakeup next year. Just today, the Court of Arbitration for Sport laid down its ruling that Russia can no longer be excluded for the "security reasons" the IIHF has referred to as it has kept Russian squads from the competition ever since the invasion of the Ukraine.
The teams and brackets for the Edmonton/Red Deer competition beginning this December are set, but this change may throw our locally hosted tournament for a loop. Multiple European hockey federation participants, including gold medal defending Sweden, have voiced their opinion that Russia should remain banned.
Beyond the underlying reasons for the ban, there are a lot of logistics to consider. It simply isn't fair to bump a bottom seeded team in the tournament to make room for a Russian squad that hasn't participated since 2022, even if the Russians likely are a better opponent. But it's also fair to say that having Russia work its way back up the rankings would be something of a farce. The teams that get relegated in international play are very clearly a step below the top four or five international programs. This gets even more complicated when considering the World Championships, hosted by Germany in 2027.
Underlying tensions
The final qualifying team for the Worlds was none other than Ukraine. Inserting Russia into the mix in any sort of direct manner likely means bumping the lowest seeded team from the tournament. Never mind that Russia probably has a better hockey program than its smaller neighbour and opponent, the Ukrainians would not react quietly to being booted from the Worlds in that manner, and nor should they.
Even assuming that the number of participating teams is simply expanded to accommodate Russia's presence, there would surely be friction and the potential for violence on the ice. The risk to the tournament and its hosting country is not insignificant. If something tragic were to occur, there would be liability concerns, not to mention potential finger pointing etc. depending on who was injured and where they were born. Canada's Secretary of Sport Adam van Koeverden has expressed a strong opinion on the matter as well, and it may be that, even given the lifted restriction, Russian players aern't able to find their way to the tournament with appropriate visa approval etc.
The truth is, Russia is one of the great hockey nations of the world, and if they were behaving differently on the world stage, they wouldn't need a court ruling to return to play in these tournaments, they'd be a coveted participant. We can only hope for that outcome in the future, for now, I don't think this story is quite over.
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