- Franz Reindl won the IIHF presidency by three votes in a runoff
- Canada no longer has a member on the IIHF Council
- Read below for the vote breakdown and what it means for Hockey Canada
International hockey has a new boss.
Germany’s Franz Reindl was elected president of the International Ice Hockey Federation on Friday at the IIHF’s Semi-Annual Congress in Tenerife, Spain. He beat Czechia’s Petr Briza 60-57 in a runoff after trailing him 48-36 in the first round.
The swing came once Kyrgyzstan’s Aivaz Omorkanov was knocked out. His support broke Reindl’s way, and that was enough to flip a 12-vote deficit into a three-vote win.
Here is the IIHF announcement:
Reindl replaces Luc Tardif, who announced in March that he wouldn’t run again and said it was time for a younger leader. That part didn’t really happen. Reindl is 71, just two years younger than the man he’s taking over for.
This one has been a long time coming for Reindl. He finished runner-up to Tardif in 2021, and he’s sat on the IIHF Council since 2016. Before that he ran the German Ice Hockey Federation from 2014 to 2022 and spent more than two decades as GM of the German national team.
He’s no stranger to the NHL either. Reindl was president of Team Europe at the 2016 World Cup of Hockey, the NHL-run event where that team made a surprise run to the final.
As a player, he was a forward on the West Germany team that took Olympic bronze in 1976. Briza has his own medal too, as the goaltender when Czechoslovakia won bronze in 1992. Briza didn’t walk away empty-handed Friday either, getting re-elected as senior vice-president.
Further down the ballot came the bigger shock. Canada is now without a member on the IIHF Council.
Hockey Canada president and CEO Katherine Henderson ran for one of the minimum three spots reserved for women. She was eliminated in the second of three rounds, and the seats went to Hungary’s Zsuzsanna Kolbenheyer, Turkey’s Merve Tunali and Poland’s Marta Zawadzka.
Check out the full council results:
Canada had been represented on council every year since 1978, other than a four-year gap from 1994 to 1998. Bob Nicholson held the vice-president role for the Americas since 2012 but didn’t seek re-election. American Mike Trimboli ran unopposed for that seat, so he’ll now speak for Canada at the table.
His four-year term starts with some heavy files waiting on his desk, including the Russia ban that the IIHF upheld for the 2027 Worlds and World Juniors. The 2027 World Championship also happens to be in Germany, so his first big tournament as president comes on home ice.
