IIHF World Championship Division III

IIHF World Championship Division III
Current season, competition or edition:
Current sports event 2016 IIHF World Championship Division III
Sport Ice hockey
Founded 1987 (Pool D)
2002 (Div II Qualification)
2003 (Division III)
No. of teams various
Most recent
champion(s)		  Turkey (2nd title)
Most titles  North Korea (4 titles)
Qualification Division III Qualification
Official website IIHF.com

The IIHF World Championship Division III are an annual sports event organized by the International Ice Hockey Federation. They are the lowest level of the IIHF World Championships.

Organization

When the IIHF reorganized its World Championships hierarchy in 2001, nations outside of the top 40 were placed in Division II Qualification. The bottom two nations from Pool D did not participate in 2001 but were promoted to Division II for 2002, and by 2003 (with growing participation), the qualification tournament was renamed Division III.

From 2001 until 2011 the two national teams that finished last in their groups at the IIHF World Championship Division II were relegated to Division III for next year's World Championships. At the Division III Championship, the two best placed teams were promoted to next year's Division II Championship. However beginning in 2012, Division II B and Division III will exchange only one team.

According to the IIHF, the Men's championships will involve a maximum of 46 nations.[1] However in 2010 Division III was played in two pools of four, and in 2008 and in 2013 a qualification tournament was played to fill the final spots in the tournament. Tournament organizer (Turkey) allowed for a seven team tournament in 2015, and was going to do so again in 2016.[2]

Promotions

From 2002 until 2011 the two national teams that place the highest are promoted to Division II. Beginning in 2012 only the first place team was promoted to Division II B.

Year Co-Champions and Promoted
2001^  Turkey  Luxembourg
2002  North Korea  Mexico
2003  New Zealand  Luxembourg
2004  Iceland  Turkey
2005  Mexico  South Africa
2006  Iceland  Turkey
2007  New Zealand  Ireland
2008  North Korea  South Africa
2009  New Zealand  Turkey
2010  North Korea  Ireland
2011  Israel  South Africa
Year Champion
2012  Turkey
2013  South Africa
2014  Bulgaria
2015  North Korea
2016  Turkey

^ – There were only two teams registered so the tournament was not played as both had automatically earned promotion

Pool D

Champions 1987–2000

Year National team
1987  Australia
1989  Belgium
1990  Great Britain
1992^  Spain
1994^  Estonia
1995^  Croatia
1996  Lithuania
1997  Croatia
1998  Bulgaria
1999  Spain
2000  Israel

^ – In 1992, 1994 and 1995 there was no Pool D. However Pool C was divided in two tiers where the winner of 'C2' was promoted to 'C1', essentially making C2 the same as D. Accordingly, the winners (Spain, Estonia and Croatia) are listed here.

Summary of participation

24 championships

Team Times First Last Gold Silver Bronze Total Best finish (first/last) Hosted
 Armenia 4 2004 2008 0 0 0 0 3rd (2006/2008) 1
 Australia 9 1987 2000 1 2 2 5 1st (1987) 1
 Belgium 8 1989 2000 1 1 0 2 1st (1989) 1
 Bosnia and Herzegovina 3 2008 2016 0 0 0 0 5th (2016) 0
 Bulgaria 4 1996 2014 2 0 0 2 1st (1998/2014) 0
 Croatia 3 1994 1997 2 0 0 2 1st (1995/1997) 0
 Spain 8 1989 1999 2 1 4 7 1st (1992/1999) 1
 Estonia 1 1994 1994 1 0 0 1 1st (1994) 0
 Georgia 4 2013 2016 0 1 0 1 2nd (2016) 0
 Great Britain 2 1989 1990 1 0 1 2 1st (1990) 1
 Greece 10 1992 2013 0 0 2 2 3rd (1992/2010) 0
 Hong Kong 4 1987 2016 0 0 0 0 4th (1987/2015) 0
 Ireland 8 2004 2013 1 1 0 2 1st (2010) 1
 Iceland 4 1999 2006 2 0 0 0 1st (2004/2006) 3
 Israel 9 1992 2011 2 1 1 4 1st (2000/2011) 0
 South Korea 5 1987 1997 0 2 1 3 2nd (1987/1997) 0
 Lithuania 2 1995 1996 1 1 0 2 1st (1996) 1
 Luxembourg 15 1992 2016 0 1 8 9 2nd (2003) 2
 Mexico 4 2000 2005 1 1 1 3 1st (2005) 3
 Mongolia 6 2007 2013 0 0 0 0 5th (2007) 0
 New Zealand 10 1987 2009 3 0 2 5 1st (2003/2009) 2
 North Korea 7 2002 2015 4 3 0 7 1st (2002/2015) 0
 Romania 1 1989 1989 0 1 0 1 2nd (1989) 0
 South Africa 13 1992 2016 1 4 1 6 1st (2013) 6
 Serbia and Montenegro[N1] 2 1996 1997 0 1 0 1 2nd (1996) 0
 Turkey 13 1992 2016 2 4 2 8 1st (2012/2016) 2
 United Arab Emirates 4 2010 2015 0 0 0 0 5th (2014) 0

See also

References

  1. ↑ Bylaw 700(2), 703(4)
  2. ↑ Bosnians make debut
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