By Canadian Press

Women’s championship returns to April in Olympic year, new wrinkles for PWHL, players

Apr 18, 2025 | 8:16 AM

ČESKÉ BUDĚJOVICE — The 2026 women’s world hockey championship will be held in April two months after the Olympic Games conclude in Milan-Cortina, Italy.

There wasn’t a women’s championship in the same calendar year as a Winter Games until 2022, when Herning and Frederikshavn, Denmark, hosted the tournament Aug. 25 to Sept. 4.

International Ice Hockey Federation women’s committee chair and Hungarian Hockey Federation president Zsuzsanna Kolbenheyer says late March-early April for the women’s championship is in the IIHF bylaws, and that Denmark’s summer tournament was a one-off.

“That was only for that year,” Kolbenheyer said. “We always wanted to put it back to the original dates.”

Canada will host the 2027 edition, but almost became the 2026 host when Germany expressed interest in holding both the men’s and women’s championships in 2027.

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But Canada reverted back to 2027 when the Germans backed off the double. The 2026 women’s host city will be announced at the IIHF’s annual congress in May.

Some women competing in Italy in February could be back on the ice less than two months later for another top international tournament.

It’ll be a new challenge for the world’s top players who choose to play in both, as well their pro leagues, but also a new decision for players who opt out of the world championship that was the pinnacle of their season for decades.

Another wrinkle is two long international breaks imposed on the Professional Women’s Hockey League in its third season in 2025-26.

Kolbenheyer said the timing of future women’s championships is a matter of discussion between the IIHF and PWHL, but the 2026 tournament is locked into April.

“We are in contact with them regarding this topic, but we decided at the council level that it would be too late to do any changes,” said Kolbenheyer, who said a survey has gone out to the women’s hockey community seeking opinions on world championship dates.

The PWHL started its second season Dec. 1. Playoffs begin May. 6

There are nine games remaining in its regular season when the league resumes April 26 after the world championship in Ceske Budejovice, Czech Republic.

The PWHL responded to a request for an interview with executive vice-president of hockey operations Jayna Hefford with the following statement:

“We’re having productive discussions with the IIHF about next season’s schedule and are optimistic we’ll be able to find a solution that is best for the IIHF, the PWHL, and the athletes.”

Shifting the women’s championship outside the PWHL season is tricky.

The international hockey calendar not only includes the men’s championship in May, the world under-20 men’s championship in December-January, the women’s under-18 championship in January and the men’s under-18 championship in April.

The IIHF also holds multiple lower-level divisional tournaments in those categories that promote and relegate countries.

The NCAA’s women’s Frozen Four in mid-March also dictates the women’s championship’s timing.

A November tournament doesn’t motivate international hockey federations to invest in women’s hockey for the rest of the season, nor are players building through a season to peak for a premiere event, Kolbenheyer said.

“There are different options to look at, but we have to find the best one for sure,” she said. “It’s a complicated question, but we are looking into it.”

In the meantime, it’s shaping up to be a heavy 2025-26 season for Canadian players with multiple Olympic training camps, the PWHL season, the Olympic Games and a world championship.

“It is a lot,” said Canadian and Toronto Sceptres defender Renata Fast. “It will be a very heavy and demanding year. Recovery is going to be extremely important to make sure everyone’s staying healthy. But, I mean, there’s still so much new in the women’s game with this league.

“Hopefully down the road, we won’t run into something like this and we can find a time for world championships in Olympic years and in non-Olympic years that works best for the game worldwide.”

2026 SEEDING

The women’s championship reverts to “snake” seeding in each of the two pools in 2026 to match the men’s under-20 and men’s and women’s under-18 championships.

Teams will be seeded based on rankings at the previous year’s championship with 1,4,5,8,9 in one pool and 2,3,6,7 and the promoted team in the other.

In an attempt to reduce lopsided scores at the women’s championship, the IIHF began seeding the world’s top countries in the same pool and lower seeds in others in various pool configurations after 2012.

All five in Pool A and the top three in Pool B reaching the quarterfinals since 2019 created problematic optics and didn’t reward winning.

A Pool A country could go winless through the tournament and not face relegation.

Switzerland’s lone victory in last year’s tournament was an overtime win over Germany in the fifth-place game to stay in Pool A, while Germany had gone 4-0 in Pool B.

And while the current format added a second marquee Canada-U.S. game to the event, some European and Asian countries want the chance to play the North Americans more, Kolbenheyer said

“When the IIHF implemented these two groups, that was never the intention to stay like this forever,” she said.

When the U.S. and Canada outscored their opposition by a combined 88-4 in the 2010 Winter Olympics, then-International Olympic Committee president Jacques Rogge said “we cannot continue without improvement.”

That was interpreted as a threat to boot women’s hockey from the Olympic program.

Double-digit margins were a lightning rod for criticism of the women’s game, although men’s tournaments also produce gaudy scores such as Czechia beating Kazakhstan 14-2 and the U.S. downing Germany 10-4 in this year’s under-20 championship in Halifax.

“Maybe there would be still big differences, in goals as well, but we could also see that it happens also on the male side,” Kolbenheyer said.

“We really think that women’s hockey has developed so much that people won’t say like they did in 2010 that women’s hockey shouldn’t be at the Olympics.

“They can deliver a good product. They can deliver great games.”

WOMEN’S TRIPLE GOLD CLUB?

The IIHF’s “Triple Gold Club” of men who have won a Stanley Cup, Olympic gold medal and world championship gold medal is a quarter-century old.

There’s currently 30 players, including 11 Canadian players and Canadian coach Mike Babcock, in it.

The NHL was a 30-team league when the IIHF established the TGC in 2001.

Expansion talk in the six-team Professional Women’s Hockey League now in its second season has planted the seed of a women’s Triple Gold Club in the future.

“We were talking about this already at the historical committee,” Kolbenheyer said. “This question is already on the table. There is no decision yet.”

The U.S. roster in Ceske Budejovice has a handful of players who won the PWHL’s inaugural Walter Cup with the Minnesota Frost in 2024, a world championship in 2023 or 2019 and an Olympic gold medal in 2018: Forwards Kendall Coyne Schofield, Kelly Pannek, defender Lee Stecklein and goaltenders Nicole Hensley and Maddie Rooney.

“To be celebrated for winning championships would mean a lot,” Coyne Schofield said.

This report by The Canadian Press was first published April 18, 2025.

Donna Spencer, The Canadian Press

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