After not having had the event for more than a decade, NHL Commissioner Gary Bettman admitted the 2016 World Cup of Hockey accomplished everything he hoped it would.
"Working together with the [NHL] Players' Association to bring it back, to bring it back big and bold and exciting was the plan," he told Oilers NOW radio host Bob Stauffer. "That's why we put it in one place and we were able to do legacy events and have the fan village and the competition - we knew it was going to be good because it was unprecedented in terms of the number of elite world class players that were participating."
Inaugurated in 1996, the World Cup of Hockey was the successor to the previous Canada Cup, which ran from 1976 to 1991. The tournament occurred twice on an irregular basis in two different Canadian host cities, with the United States winning in 1996 (in Montreal) and Canada winning in 2004 (in Toronto).
This year, Toronto welcomed back the hockey tournament with open arms and saw Team Canada once again reclaim the cup in a best-of-three win over Team Europe.
"All-in-all, we were very pleased with how it went and we're excited about the opportunities to do it again," said Bettman.
World Cup a success
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