page_title: South Korea men's national ice hockey team
section_title: History
hierarchical_section_title: South Korea men's national ice hockey team / History
caption_attribution_description: Українська: Чемпіонат світу з хокею 2017 у першому дивізіоні. Республіка Корея - Польща
context_page_description: The South Korean national ice hockey team is the national men's ice hockey team of the Republic of Korea. They are currently ranked 16th in the IIHF World Rankings and competed in the World Championship top division tournament. The team's most successful campaign thus far was a second-place finish in the 2017 Division I Group A tournament and thus qualifying for the top division in 2018. They competed in their first Winter Olympics in 2018 in Pyeongchang as the host nation.
context_section_description: South Korea first participated in the World Championship in 1979, playing in Pool C, the third level of the tournament. They did not return until 1982, again in Pool C, and became a regular participant in 1986. They remained at the Division I level, the second tier of the World Championship, from 2010 until 2017, when they earned a promotion to the 2018 World Championship.
  Upon being named the host country for the 2018 Winter Olympics in Pyeongchang, the South Korean team began efforts to steadily improve themselves in order to be competitive with the other teams expected at the tournament, led by the efforts of Korea Ice Hockey Association president Chung Mong-won.
  Several North American players playing for teams in South Korea were offered South Korean citizenship, thus allowing them to play at the Olympics. This was done to help the team perform better in the lead-up to the Olympics, which proved successful: when awarded the Olympics in 2011, the South Korean team was ranked 31st in the IIHF World Ranking, while on the eve of the Olympics had moved up to 18th.
caption: South Korea at the 2017 World Championship Division IA tournament in Ukraine. They finished second and earned promotion to the 2018 IIHF World Championship Top Division tournament for the first time.
exif: {"Image Make": "Xiaomi", "Image Model": "Redmi Note3", "Image XResolution": "72", "Image YResolution": "72", "Image ResolutionUnit": "Pixels/Inch", "Image DateTime": "2017:04:22 19:17:12", "Image YCbCrPositioning": "Centered", "Image ExifOffset": "178", "GPS GPSAltitudeRef": "0", "GPS GPSLatitudeRef": "N", "GPS GPSLatitude": "[50, 30, 568947/10000]", "GPS GPSLongitudeRef": "E", "GPS GPSLongitude": "[30, 35, 216053/5000]", "GPS GPSAltitude": "0", "GPS GPSTimeStamp": "[16, 17, 10]", "GPS GPSProcessingMethod": "ASCII", "GPS GPSDate": "2017:04:22", "Image GPSInfo": "662", "Thumbnail Compression": "JPEG (old-style)", "Thumbnail XResolution": "72", "Thumbnail YResolution": "72", "Thumbnail ResolutionUnit": "Pixels/Inch", "Thumbnail JPEGInterchangeFormat": "998", "Thumbnail JPEGInterchangeFormatLength": "17408", "EXIF ExposureTime": "1/50", "EXIF FNumber": "2", "EXIF ExposureProgram": "Unidentified", "EXIF ISOSpeedRatings": "106", "EXIF ExifVersion": "0220", "EXIF DateTimeOriginal": "2017:04:22 19:17:12", "EXIF DateTimeDigitized": "2017:04:22 19:17:12", "EXIF ComponentsConfiguration": "YCbCr", "EXIF ShutterSpeedValue": "5643/1000", "EXIF ApertureValue": "2", "EXIF BrightnessValue": "0", "EXIF MeteringMode": "CenterWeightedAverage", "EXIF Flash": "Flash did not fire, compulsory flash mode", "EXIF FocalLength": "357/100", "EXIF SubSecTime": "744249", "EXIF SubSecTimeOriginal": "744249", "EXIF SubSecTimeDigitized": "744249", "EXIF FlashPixVersion": "0100", "EXIF ColorSpace": "sRGB", "EXIF ExifImageWidth": "4608", "EXIF ExifImageLength": "3456", "Interoperability InteroperabilityIndex": "R98", "Interoperability InteroperabilityVersion": "[48, 49, 48, 48]", "EXIF InteroperabilityOffset": "631", "EXIF SensingMethod": "One-chip color area", "EXIF SceneType": "Directly Photographed", "EXIF ExposureMode": "Auto Exposure", "EXIF WhiteBalance": "Auto", "EXIF FocalLengthIn35mmFilm": "4", "EXIF SceneCaptureType": "Standard"}