Event #5- Slovakia not given a birth in the 2016 World Cup of Hockey

If you’ve read chapters 1 & 2 of this essay, you realize how much of a travesty this is.  Back in the 2010 Olympics, Slovakia pushed Canada to their very limits in the Semi-Final on Canadian soil. In 2012 Slovakia made the Finals of the World Championships and took home the Silver Medal.

Now a few years later, with the shameful history of snubs at the 1998 and 2002 Winter Olympics, why would the Slovaks not be given a birth in the World Cup of Hockey?

Event #6- The Media refuses to acknowledge that Team Europe is Lead by Slovakia

I watched the large majority of Team Europe’s 6 games in this tournament and not once did I hear a commentator or pundit point-out that Team Europe was largely lead by Slovakians.  Team Europe’s core was 6 elite Slovakian players, including goaltender Jaroslav Halak, as well as star players Anze Kopitar and Roman Josi. Beyond that, the roster was filled out by role players from the smaller hockey nations.

 A Deep Analysis of Team Europe

If you are familiar with what True Champion Sports stands for, we are all about quantifying sports performance and topics as accurately as possible.  I’ve conducted a project to quantify what percentage each of the 8 nations comprising Team Europe accounts for.

It would be easy, but not nearly accurate enough to make this calculation by dividing the number of players on the roster from each country by the total roster.  A much more accurate way to calculate the percentage of each nation’s role in Team Europe is by accounting for all ice-time played by every player. That gives the truest data on how Team Europe is comprised.

 In addition to ice-time, it’s also important to investigate the scoring breakdown by the Europeans, as well as the leadership-contingent of this new hockey entity.

Team Leadership

President-  Franz Reindl  (Germany)

General Manager-Miroslav Satan (Slovakia)

Head Coach- Ralph Krueger (Canadian /German/ Swiss)

Assistant Coach- Paul Maurice (Canada)

Assistant Coach- Brad Shaw (Canada)

Captain- Anze Kopitar (Slovenia)

Assistant Captain- Zdeno Chara (Slovakia)

Assistant Captain- Mark Streit (Switzerland)

Other Veteran Leaders- Marian Hossa (Slovakia),  Marian Gaborik (Slovakia),  Thomas Vanek (Austria)

This overview of the team’s leadership reveals a true mish-mash of players, coaches, and managers. Germans, Slovakians, Canadians, and a Slovenian all have a significant role in the make-up of Team Europe’s leadership contingent. 

Ice-time Data for Team Europe

Heading into the Finals, here were the total minutes of ice-time logged by the 8 nations that make up Team Europe during the Round Robin, and the Semi-Final versus Sweden.  The corresponding percentage of the Team’s total minutes played is calculated:

Slovakians played 44% of all the minutes played by Team Europe’s players. 

Slovakians played 3 times more than both the 2^nd and 3^rd leading nations on Team Europe- (Switzerland and Germany).

*(I used data from the first 4 games of the tournament to give the most accurate representation of the make-up of Team Europe. I omitted the 2 games in the Finals because Team Europe lost Marian Gaborik to a broken foot; one of their ice-time leaders, and most important players).

What this data illustrates is that the most accurate way to look at Team Europe is not simply as a mish-mash of 8 nations as the media has presented, but rather as a team comprised by 40-45% Team Slovakia, and 55-60% the ‘mish-mash’ of the smaller  hockey nations in Europe.

Scoring Data for Team Europe  

In the 6 games that Team Europe played, the following is the same type of research that I did for ice-time, but now for the scoring breakdown amongst the 8 nations represented within the team.

(*To calculate total percentage of Team Europe’s scoring, I used a logical and somewhat standard weighting system where goals are worth 2 points, and assists are worth 1 point.)

Slovakians scored 8 of Team Europe’s 12 goals in the tournament.  When quantified with the weighting system described above, the Slovaks accounted for 42% of Team Europe’s total offensive output.

Concluding thoughts on Team Europe and the World Cup

Team Europe was predominantly lead by Slovakia. 

In the 3 major categories- The Team’s Leadership, the minutes of ice-time played by Europe’s players, and the offensive output- Slovakians lead the way. On top of this, the only Goalie to play at all for Team Europe, is Slovakian Jaroslav Halak- and no other goalie saw the ice during the 6 tournament games.

Hockey fans, let’s give credit where credit is due.  Team Slovakia should receive 40-45% of the credit for the new Team Europe’s impressive run in the 2016 World Cup of Hockey, resulting in the Silver Medal.  Yet again, they have proven that they belong in the “Elite-7 Hockey Nations”, and should have been able to send their own National Team to this World Cup.

Having said that, I believe that Team Europe has been a fascinating new participant in the 2016 version of the World Cup of Hockey.  For starters, their uniforms, logo, and color-scheme was top-notch!  

I actually like the idea of having a Team Europe entrant into the occasional major tournament going forward, that would be comprised of the smaller hockey nations which are not deep enough to compete with the 7 elite hockey nations, but do produce some world-class players.  It’s nice to see players like Anze Kopitar, Roman Josi, Mats Zuccarello, Christian Erhoff and the others in a best-on-best tournament.

However, I’d love to see a Team Europe, separate from Team Slovakia. As proven throughout this essay, Slovakia should have its own team.  Team Europe would then become a true underdog and be comprised of players from Switzerland, Germany, Denmark, Latvia, Norway, Austria, France, Slovenia, Kazakhstan, and Belarus in major tournaments like this World Cup.