Canada Cup - History

History

Due to National Hockey League (NHL) players' ineligibility in the Winter Olympics and the annual World Championships, both amateur competitions, Canada was not able to field their best players in top international tournaments. While the top players in Europe qualified as amateurs, all the best Canadian players competed in the professional NHL or World Hockey Association.

Following the 1972 and 1974 Summit Series, in which Canadian players from the NHL and World Hockey Association (WHA) competed against the top players from the Soviet Union, there was interest in a world hockey championship where each country could send its best players. In a combined effort from Douglas Fisher of Hockey Canada and Alan Eagleson of the NHL Players' Association, plans for such a tournament soon began.

After successful negotiations with hockey officials from the Soviet Union in September 1974, Eagleson began arranging the Canada Cup tournament, which debuted in 1976. Eagleson would later plead guilty to embezzling hundreds of thousands of dollars of Canada Cup proceeds.

Taking place in the NHL off-season, it was the first international hockey tournament in which the best players from all nations, professional and amateur alike, could compete against one another. In addition to Canada and the Soviet Union, Czechoslovakia, Finland, Sweden and the United States were regular competitors (with the exception of West Germany replacing Finland in 1984). The tournaments, held every three or four years, took place in North American venues. Of the five Canada Cup tournaments, four were won by Canada, while the Soviet Union won once, in 1981.

Canada won the inaugural Canada Cup in 1976, defeating recent 1976 World Championship gold medalists Czechoslovakia in the final. The championship game was won by a 5–4 score with Darryl Sittler scoring the game-winner in overtime. Five years later, the Soviets won their first and only Canada Cup with an 8-1 win over Canada in the final. The Canadians then re-captured the championship in the third edition of the tournament in 1984. After Canadian Mike Bossy scored an overtime game-winner to defeat the Soviets in the semi-finals, Canada won their second Canada Cup in a victory over Sweden in the final.

The 1987 Canada Cup was particularly noteworthy as Wayne Gretzky and Mario Lemieux, widely considered two of the greatest hockey players of all-time, joined together as linemates on Team Canada to capture the country's third championship. All three games in the final between Canada and the Soviets ended in 6-to-5 scores, with two games going to overtime. Lemieux dramatically scored the championship-winning goal on a 2-on-1 pass from Gretzky in the final minutes of the deciding game at Copps Coliseum in Hamilton, Ontario.

The final Canada Cup was held in 1991 with Canada defeating the United States in the tournament's first all-North American final, for their third straight championship and fourth overall. Five years later, the Canada Cup was replaced by the World Cup of Hockey in 1996.