It took a hockey miracle, but 75 years after joining the IIHF, the Danish men’s national team came out of nowhere to secure a berth in the Winter Olympics. It wasn't an easy ride.
In August, three slots were still available for the 2022 men’s Olympic hockey tournament, as qualification events pitted hopeful national squads against one another. Two of those berths were taken by countries who have made the Olympic field before, Slovakia and Latvia.
The third entry for Beijing was a first-timer: Denmark.
The Danes joined the IIHF in 1946 but had never made the Olympics until now, a tidy 75 years later. While the progress may be subtle to outsiders, Danish hockey is now in its golden age. The revolution is being led by NHLers such as Winnipeg’s Nikolaj Ehlers – who topped the qualification tournament with nine points in three games – and Columbus mainstay Oliver Bjorkstrand, who popped in five points of his own. “It’s a huge honor to be a part of,” Bjorkstrand said. “It’s been a long time coming for Denmark, we’ve tried to make it there for a long time now. We’ve been in Group A of the men’s World Championship for a lot of years, the juniors have done well and made it to Group A and the last step was to make the Olympics. Speaking for everyone in Denmark hockey, we’re super pumped about it.”
Bjorkstrand is part of a fascinating subset of Danish players who all come from the small city of Herning. Even with a population of just 50,000, Herning boasted five members on the Olympic-qualifying team and will almost certainly add a sixth for Beijing in Carolina goalie Frederik Andersen.
The story of Herning is so interesting that one local author and filmmaker made a documentary about the phenomenon entitled The Hockey Miracle in the Middle of Nowhere.
Rasmus Ankersen travelled the world for his 2012 book The Gold Mine Effect, which saw him investigate why certain places produce a disproportionate number of elite athletes in the same sport, such as sprinters in Jamaica or women’s golfers in South Korea. “I played street hockey as a kid, but I never realized how crazy this story was,” Ankersen said. “The funny thing is I went around the world visiting all these places and wrote a book about it, then realized the most impressive of these stories was right on my doorstep in Herning.”
The crux of the story is that in the late 1980s, Herning’s hockey team (now known as the Herning Blue Fox) underwent a revolution under coach Frits Nielsen, the father of future NHLer Frans Nielsen. The coach saw a team that played fancy but didn’t get results, so he transformed the culture and established the mantra “Will Beats Skill.”
Nielsen also began to find hidden-gem imports. American goal-scorer Todd Bjorkstrand, punishing Canadian defenseman Dan Jensen and Finnish former playmaking NHLer Petri Skriko were among his haul. All three brought accountability on top of their skill sets, and Herning began to dominate the Danish League, winning six titles in eight years during the 1990s. Bjorkstrand broke 100 points three straight years, despite never playing more than 52 games in a season.
Soon enough, a second generation began to emerge: the sons. Frans Nielsen was the first to head to the NHL, followed by Nicklas Jensen, Frederik Andersen – whose father, Ernst, was a goalie for Herning – and Oliver Bjorkstrand. Local Peter Regin also found his way to the NHL. “The city really started developing something good in hockey,” Bjorkstrand said. “A lot of players came out of there and made it pretty far. Looking back at my childhood and playing hockey there, it was a good system. Guys came and wanted to get better, and it was competitive. They have a good thing going on there and, thinking about it, it was a really good thing for me. In 2018 when we had the World Championship in Herning, we had 10-12 guys from there. It’s special being with those guys and doing it together.”
Some left Denmark to hone their skills in North America as teens. The junior Bjorkstrand, for example, played three years in the WHL with the Portland Winterhawks. How smaller hockey nations ought to develop talent has always been fodder for debate, but Denmark’s greatest generation found the balance. “Up to a certain age, it’s much better to be a big fish in a small pond,” Ankersen said. “But at some point, you need to get out to the big pond. There are a lot of benefits (to staying home) because you get more opportunities and maybe play on two or three teams. Frans Nielsen, for example, played on three different national teams in the same year.”
Making the Olympics is sweet enough on its own, but with 35-year-old Regin and 37-year-old Nielsen getting what is likely their last – and only – opportunity to play in the Games, there was an added layer of satisfaction for the younger Bjorkstrand. “I thought that was a special part of it,” he said. “Looking around the room, there were also other guys who played in Europe and have been on the national team for a lot of years and this was probably their last shot at the Olympics. We had expectations to win the qualifier this year, and you could feel it, the guys really wanted it. For the older guys, I was happy to be a part of helping them make it to the Olympics to experience that.”
Now that they’ve qualified, the Danes will look to make an impact. Denmark has been slotted into a group with Russia, Switzerland and the Czech Republic – a competitive group, but one that perhaps the Danes could make noise in if they play their cards right. “We like to stay on top of opponents and get the puck out fast,” Bjorkstrand said. “Our strong side is probably the offensive part of our team, so for us to win games, we have to make sure that’s going. When we’re on it, we’re good. We’re not necessarily the most physical team but for us to be successful we have to make sure we’re skating, because we’re all good skaters.”
Meanwhile, Slovakia and Latvia will both play in the same pool, joining Nordic titans Sweden and Finland. Slovakia beat Belarus in its final qualification game to secure its bid, while Latvia knocked off France to go undefeated in their tourney.