Women's Ice Hockey IIHF Division I Group A World Championship 2026

[copravolley 656]

2-3 against Hungary. Big disappointment. Unfortunately, it seems our good form was only to the Olympics and no at the World Championships were crucial for us. We had a big chance against France, because I expected a loss against Hungary. It's also fair to say that Hungary and France, relying primarily on their own athletes and have been better than Italy for many years and even bringing in 7-8 North American athletes didn't help us. Unfortunately, despite advancing to the top 8 for the Olympics, the Italian project will last even shorter than China, as they at least advanced to the elite group. In a year, I suspect we'll be fighting relegation against the Netherlands. In reality, that 8th place at the Olympics means nothing anymore, and in a 1 month, no one will remember it. Even the young girls from Slovakia played better here than us, where there isn't even a single Canadian player. If we finish in 4th place, it will be only 2 positions better than in 2019 - when we had a very weak team.

[copravolley 656]

Fantin's injury didn't help, but the fact that the Canadian head coach didn't even show up at the tournament shows certain priorities – only the Olympics were important, and the project will soon be over. I`, sure that half of our Canadian players won't be playing for the Italian national team in a next year. France will qualify, because I don't believe they won't beat Slovakia tomorrow. Congratulations to France for having a long-term vision for this sport, not just for a single home event.

Edited 4 hours ago by copravolley

[copravolley 656]

Hungary is simply much better than Italy (it is clear that Orban has been investing much in sports, because they are strong despite their small population) – we haven't beaten them in 20 years or more. A window of opportunity arose when Hungary unexpectedly lost to Slovakia, and we could have advanced, but we didn't capitalize on it. Because of the loss to Slovakia, Hungary won't finish first. However, Italy certainly didn't deserve to advance, since they lost to both Hungary and Slovakia. Our form was simply poor and our best player- Fantin, was out with injured. However, that doesn't change the fact that with seven or eight Canadian players of Fortino caliber, we should have played much better here.

Edited 4 hours ago by copravolley

[copravolley 656]

On 4/16/2026 at 9:02 PM, hckošice said:

Friday April 17th, 2026 -

Round-Robin Day 4 Schedule (GMT +2)

 

12:30   France vs China

16:00   Hungary vs Italy

19:30   Slovakia vs Norway

Apart from the match against Italy, Slovakia plays much better than Italy here. This is a big negative surprise for me, especially since Slovakia hasn't naturalized anyone.

[hckošice 16,637]

17 minutes ago, copravolley said:

Apart from the match against Italy, Slovakia plays much better than Italy here. This is a big negative surprise for me, especially since Slovakia hasn't naturalized anyone.

Quite hard to imagine Slovakia having naturalized players in hockey. Pretty sure it is a unwritten no go zone for the federation. We use to call ourselves as a hockey nation and having the need to naturalize players to play in our national team would be badly viewed by the general public I guess. Kinda matter of honor or pride I assume. We had/have time by time a player born abroad in Ukraine, Croatia or Poland in our teams but it was always since the minor age categories, never directly in the seniors teams

 

Peter Šťastný played for Canada long years before ending his career for Slovakia at the WOG in Lillehammer, but this is a different story, he raised and played here for Czechoslovakia before deflecting to Canada in the 70s

[hckošice 16,637]

Friday April 17th, 2026 -

Round-Robin Day 4 Results (GMT +2)

 

12:30   France  8 - 1  China

16:00   Hungary  3 - 2  Italy

19:30   Slovakia  5 - 1  Norway

 

Provisional Standing After Day 4:

 

1.    9

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2.   9

3.   8

4.   7

5.   3

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6.   0  Relegated to Women´s Division I Group B WCh 2027

[copravolley 656]

2 minutes ago, hckošice said:

Quite hard to imagine Slovakia having naturalized players in hockey. Pretty sure it is a unwritten no go zone for the federation. We use to call ourselves as a hockey nation and having the need to naturalize players to play in our national team would be badly viewed by the general public I guess. Kinda matter of honor or pride I assume. We had/have time by time a player born abroad in Ukraine, Croatia or Poland in our teams but it was always since the minor age categories, never directly in the seniors teams

 

Peter Šťastný played for Canada long years before ending his career for Slovakia at the WOG in Lillehammer, but this is a different story, he raised and played here for Czechoslovakia before deflecting to Canada in the 70s

In my opinion, in the women's hockey every country except Canada and the USA could naturalize someone and strengthen itself. I'm not talking about 7-8 people like Italy, but let's say 2-3. Then Slovakia would have been playing in the Elite category long ago, and possibly at the Olympics, but I wish you good luck tomorrow against France. It would be great if someone new advanced to the Elite, not only France or Hungary.

[hckošice 16,637]

Saturday April 18th, 2026 -

Round-Robin Last Day Schedule (GMT +2)

 

12:30   China vs Italy

16:00   Slovakia vs France

19:30   Norway vs Hungary

[copravolley 656]

Italy's expectations were probably too high – we were newcomers here. Our performance at the Olympics was up our capabilities, in my opinion. Now it's crucial to continue this project and hire a good coach who will work seriously for all time, not just for the Olympics, like Bouchard.

Edited 1 hour ago by copravolley

[hckošice 16,637]

12 minutes ago, copravolley said:

In my opinion, in the women's hockey every country except Canada and the USA could naturalize someone and strengthen itself. I'm not talking about 7-8 people like Italy, but let's say 2-3. Then Slovakia would have been playing in the Elite category long ago, and possibly at the Olympics, but I wish you good luck tomorrow against France. It would be great if someone new advanced to the Elite, not only France or Hungary.

Thanks. We´ll see. If it has to happen it will. It it does not have to happen yet, it will not... yet.

 

Our woman´s program is working a couple of years now with a group of girls since their early teenage years, through Youth Winter Olympics and EYOFs and several team meetings, the core of the group is still around late teen and early twentys. Also it is obviously build around Nela Lopušanová who is still 18 years old.

 

The goal was set for the Olympics, maybe 2030 will be too soon but the program is showing every year bigger results and is still not over, we hopw by 2034 being a competitive team at the Olympics.

 

For the worlds we also are trying step by step, so even if not tomorrow this group of girls will certainly qualify to the elite in the upcoming time and the goal is obviously to be able to stay there as well once our time will arrive.