Host country France Teams 12 Runner-up Canada | Dates 8–23 February Venue(s) Méribel Ice Palace | |
Champions Unified Team (1st title) | ||
The men's ice hockey tournament (women's was added in 1998) at the 1992 Winter Olympics in Albertville, France, was the 16th Olympic Championship. The games were played at the Méribel Ice Palace in Méribel, about 45 km from host city Albertville. The competition, held from 8 to 23 February, was won by the Unified Team in its only appearance. The team was composed of some newly emerged nations from the former Soviet Union, which had dissolved just weeks before the Games began. The silver medal win by Canada extended its all-time Olympic ice hockey lead to 11 medals (extended to 15 medals, for the men's team, as of the 2014 Winter Olympics).
Contents
Qualification
The Olympic tournament was to be contested by twelve nations. The top eleven nations from the 1991 World Championships (eight from pool A, top three from pool B) qualified directly, while the twelfth ranked nation had to play off against the winner of that year's pool C.
Poland qualified in final tournament
First round
Twelve participating teams were placed in two groups. After playing a round-robin, the top four teams in each group advanced to the Medal Round while the last two teams competed in the Consolation Round for the 9th to 12th places.
Group B
Top four teams (shaded ones) advanced to the medal round.
Consolation Round 9th-12th Places
11th Place Match
9th Place Match
Consolation Round 5th-8th Places
7th Place Match
5th Place Match
Final Rankings
- Unified Team
- Canada
- Czechoslovakia
- United States
- Sweden
- Germany
- Finland
- France
- Norway
- Switzerland
- Poland
- Italy
Unified Medal controversy
Russian goaltender Nikolai Khabibulin was the third on the depth chart and never played when the Unified Team won gold in Albertville, France. Instead of giving the gold to someone who did not play, coach Viktor Tikhonov kept it. Only players are given Olympic medals; coaches and management are not. The medal was finally returned to him in a private medal ceremony during the 2002 Winter Olympics in Salt Lake City, Utah.