Well, the U18 Girls World Championship was cancelled for the second year in a row. Several other tourneys were cancelled too, though none other at the top level of IIHF competition. At least at first. Covid eventually took down the U20 Men's World Juniors too.
What. A. Mess.
Thousands of words have been written about the cancellation of the U18 Girls and it's hard to say anything that hasn't already been said. I think the thing that gets me the most is that it feels like the IIHF just doesn't get that the way girls and womens hockey fans feel about our iteration of the game is the exact same way that boys and mens hockey fans feel about that iteration of the game. Full stop.
It should not be surprising that if the girls tourney gets cancelled repeatedly, you will get absolutely dragged by fans, leading to a petition with over 80,000 signatures calling for the tournament to postponed to a safe time, not cancelled completely. And eventually, the media ARE going to get involved and start talking about it too, furthering the bad look to the IIHF.
So here we are. I'm completely confused why the IIHF published the statement they did defending the decision. It was like they took the worst part of the IIHF interview they did with president Luc Tardif and then blasted that piece of it on Twitter. Why on earth?
It's not great because it demonstrates some of the issues within the growth of hockey, but USA Hockey may step in and save the U18 tourney, hosting in 2022 rather than 2023. The Swedes aren't interested in rescheduling apparently which is also not a good look. If USA Hockey can step in and save it, great, but I have to think USA Hockey and Hockey Canada get tired of basically holding up the structure of women's hockey. Good for them though; in the previous debacle when politician Iain Rankin took down the Women's Worlds (I know, I know, he was trying to do what was right) Hockey Canada saved the day by moving it to Calgary. It doesn't go unnoticed.
But like I say, I just wish the hockey world understood how much women's fans love our game. Seeing the reaction after covid took down the men's tourney...it was like looking in a mirror! It sucks to have your stuff canceled, eh?
But as an aside, in their defense of cancelling the U18 girls, IIHF did share some things they've been up to for girls and women's hockey. Now, why this isn't widely promoted in the first place instead of shared when in crisis mode, I'm not sure. But here are a few good things: I'm not giving cookies, because some of this just rights long standing wrongs, but I'm also happy to read about this.
1- the Senior Women's World Championship is going to be played annually now, no longer skipping the Olympic year. GREAT. Can't wait to watch when Denmark hosts in 2022 starting August 26.
2- The IIHF is going to push to expand the Olympic tourney to 12 teams
3- IIHF has tripled Olympic support, including prize money
4- IIHF Women's Committee will have one of biggest budgets of all committees
Tardif was the founding president of the French Ice Hockey Federation (2006) and says he was instrumental in providing support to women's hockey there. I wouldn't know if he was or wasn't. I do know that France is producing some badass women's hockey players like Chloe Aurard who is a senior forward at #3 Northeastern University.
So....I hate what the IIHF did last week cancelling a top level girl tourney and not the boys (at first). I think they were rightly shredded for that, and I love the women's hockey world for fighting back. I wish the IIHF understood how much people love the women's game, and sure hope this tourney eventually gets played.
But Tardif asked to be judged at the end of the story, not the middle. I will grant him that, perhaps foolishly, but nonetheless. He's a few months into a job, he's done some good things for girls hockey, done one crappy thing that he still has a chance to fix, and of course there is a global pandemic even if we are all tired of it.
https://www.iihf.com/en/news/31418/addressing_tournament_cancellations
