GRAND FORKS, N.D. - The inaugural International Ice Hockey Federation (IIHF) Twelve-Nations Invitational Tournament Series begins tomorrow in Vierumaki, Finland, and will include plenty of representation from the 2011-12 Fighting Sioux women's hockey team.
Juniors Jocelyne Lamoureux (Grand Forks, N.D.) and Monique Lamoureux-Kolls (Grand Forks, N.D.) will participate with the United States, redshirt freshman Michelle Karvinen (Rodovre, Denmark) will compete with Finland and Andrea Dalen (Honefoss, Norway) will play for Norway.
"It is always exciting when members of our team can represent their country," UND head coach Brian Idalski said. "This is a great event for women's hockey and the experience the kids will receive will be good for both their national team and what they will bring back to the NCAA level."
The Twelve-Nations Series is one of the IIHF's initiatives to accelerate the development of women's hockey. Determined one of its biggest goals set at the World Hockey Summit in August, 2010, hockey leaders comprised of the National Hockey League, IIHF, USA Hockey and Hockey Canada met with the common theme of "Global Teamwork Promoting the Growth of the Game." UND associate head coach Peter Elander was selected as a special panelist during the first-time event held in Toronto.
Teams will be split into three tiers and partake in a series of three tournaments.
Pool A: USA, Canada, Finland and Sweden
Pool B: Russia, Switzerland, Slovakia and Japan
Pool C: Germany, Norway, Czech Republic and France
The top eight teams will play a round-robin tournament Aug. 24-Sept. 3 in Vierumaki while at the same time from Aug. 28-30 the four Pool C teams will have a six-game event in Couchevel, France.
Pools B and C will meet in a third tournament held from Nov. 9-14 in Fussen, Germany.
Opposed to the Women's World Championship played in several divisions and groups next spring, the teams don't fight for medals in this one-time Twelve Nations Invitational Tournament Series. It focuses on developing players from countries that are candidates to take part in the Olympic women's ice hockey tournament in less than three years, and to give them the opportunity to play more international games.
The tournaments are subsidized by the IIHF and will be staged on top of all the other international tournaments and exhibition games organized by various national ice hockey associations so that the teams and players can play more often at a high level.
"For some teams it's the only opportunity to play the top teams outside of the IIHF Ice Hockey Women's World Championship or an Olympic Games," adds Tanya Foley, the IIHF's Women's Program Manager. "We wanted to provide a program to help with the preparation for the Olympic Qualification process that starts this coming season."
Host Russia and the top-five other nations according to the 2012 IIHF Women's World Ranking, which will be determined following the 2012 IIHF Ice Hockey Women's World Championship season, receive a bye to the Olympic women's ice hockey tournament in Sochi 2014. Two more teams will be determined through qualification tournaments in the 2012-2013 season.
The Fighting Sioux open their season with a pair of exhibition games against the Manitoba Bisons at the Ralph Engelstad Arena on Sept. 23-24.
~GO SIOUX~
