World Hockey Summit ends, steering committee hopeful for future

The World Hockey Summit in Toronto came to a close last Thursday evening with pledges from the steering committee to continue to “work together” to “grow the game”.  The four-day conference brought together global hockey leaders and public stakeholders from North America and Europe to discuss pertinent issues currently challenging the growth of the game.  While there were no expectations going into the Summit of immediate consensus nor formal adoption of new policies on major topics such as the status of NHL players’ further participation in future Winter Olympics, such issues were thoroughly discussed and debated.  Panellists, delegates and media ended up learning about the multiple factors involved in decision-making on junior hockey development, growing the women’s game, player safety and other areas, thus gaining a new appreciation for different perspectives.

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IIHF President Rene Fasel consistently championed the inclusion of NHL players at the Olympics throughout the week and made an additional pledge on Thursday afternoon in response to the imbalance between North America and Europe in women’s hockey.  “I promise to women all over the world who play hockey … we’re going to put some money, effort and passion into developing the women’s game.  I promise I will push very hard to find a way at Sochi in 2014 to have less of a gap than what we had in Vancouver.”  Fasel also encouraged his fellow leaders to maintain a long-term vision, work together and take action on many of the ideas presented.  “If we don’t care about the future, in 10 to 20 years, we are nowhere.   That’s why development is the first priority.  Safety and development are really important … Some very good ideas were presented.  Now we have to go back and ‘make our homework’.  We will take action, summarize, prioritize, agree, discuss, fight and then we have to act.  We need to work together.”

USA Hockey executive director Dave Ogrean similarly recognized the complexity of the tasks at hand and encouraged a spirit of cooperation.  “The great thing about this sport is that there is none that is as collegial and collaborative.  There is a lot of work to do.  I hope everyone goes back home motivated to get to work …  The work, the commitment, the funding, the political will and the action has got to take place in our own federations and in every individual community.”  Ogrean gave much of the credit for the advancement of the profile of hockey to the NHL, noting ”there’s no league that works with a sport anywhere near as well and with as much commitment as the NHL does,” then thanked Hockey Canada for their generosity.  ”They’re great partners, their game is so entrenched and it means so much in Canada and they’re always willing to share it with the rest of the world and all of us.”

He concluded his podium remarks by stating he looked forward to attending more summits in the future to gauge progress from around the world.  At the post-Summit media conference he shared how he “never realized how similar Scandinavian countries are with the U.S. and Canada at the grassroots level.  They’re built under the same model, totally volunteer-based, dealing with the same issues on how to recruit and train volunteers,” emphasizing the collective need to develop the game in a similar fashion in North America and Europe.

NHL deputy commissioner Bill Daly called the World Hockey Summit a “monumental success” and came away impressed by “a lot of bright ideas, bright people and really good dialogue and discussion [and] found all the sessions very entertaining, enlightening and it forces us all to take a look at the game we love and look at ways to make it better and grow it.”

Bob Nicholson, president and CEO of Hockey Canada said that the closing of the Summit also represented a new beginning.  “This is just the start.  We have to challenge everyone here,” including the NHL when he said “we need you”, alluding to his desire to see its players participating in the next Olympics.  He praised the NHLPA for providing the ”best role models in any sport” and looked forward to Hockey Canada board meetings on Friday where he would ”set new challenges and new agendas to try to grow the game.”  Finally, he called for accountability from his fellow leaders and himself, pledging, “Don’t let us off the hook.  Bring us back to what’s happened the last three days, so that we make the game better.”