Ice hockey in Australia has been enjoying a slow but steady progression into the world of Australian sports over the past few years.
In the past two weeks, the Australian men and U18 boys teams have both won gold medals in their World Championship Divisions, and will be promoted.
In February, our women’s team took top seeds Netherlands all the way to a shootout, but lost by one penalty shot to be left with a still-impressive silver medal, though not yet promotion.
Two of these World Championship events were held here in Australia, in Melbourne and in Newcastle.
And while the sport’s biggest show is under way – the NHL’s Stanley Cup finals – the Australian Ice Hockey League began last week with a league now boasting eight teams, with Perth in a trial process looking to join next in 2012.
The Australian Ice Hockey League (AIHL) includes two teams from each of Melbourne and Sydney, with one from Adelaide, Gold Coast, Canberra and Newcastle. The NSW Central Coast had a team from 2005-2008.
AIHL teams play 24 games each that stretch from April to August, with the finals tournament held on the first weekend of September.
As the results of the Australian national teams prove, the high standard set by the AIHL is equivalent or exceeds some of the European leagues. The Aussie men’s team defeated Belgium and Serbia in the World Championships early this month, which both have national professional leagues.
The semi-professional AIHL is able to punch above its weight for a couple of reasons.
The first is that the AIHL runs in the off-season of the Northern Hemisphere leagues.
The second is that the lifestyle and weather of an Australian winter is often as attractive as a summer in colder climes, with the benefits of travelling and playing hockey in and around Australia.
With most of the teams enjoying the services of professional or college-level import players, and local players mostly picked from the Australian men’s, junior and youth teams, the AIHL feel they have something to brag about.
Certainly mainstream media is starting to come around.
While coverage has always been strong in the smaller communities such as Canberra, Adelaide and Newcastle, penetration has been minimal in the country’s two biggest footy strongholds, Melbourne and Sydney.
Melbourne, however, is starting to come around after the Olympic dual-rink facility opened on the doorstep to the CBD in time for last year’s Vancouver Winter Olympics. The success of the 2010 AIHL Finals and this year’s IIHF World Championships has seen increased media interest and almost surprise from major papers.
AIHL Finals were broadcast on Fox Sports in 2008 and 2009, but other than local news coverage the AIHL hasn’t been able to get the interest of the big-city free-to-air networks.
The AIHL believe that it will be word of mouth, quality of entertainment and innovative communication such as social media that will give them the break they need to leave novelty behind and reach the status of being a major minor sport.
Success, as they say, doesn’t happen overnight.
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