2012 IIHF World Championship The 2012 IIHF World Championship was the 76th IIHF World Championship , an annual international hockey tournament . It took place between 4 – 20 May 2012 in Finland and Sweden . This tournament determined the countries ’ seeding for the men ’ s Olympic Ice Hockey tournament in Sochi for the 2014 Winter Olympics , and for all countries participating in the qualification program leading up to the Olympics . Russia won the tournament by defeating Slovakia 6 – 2 in the final game ; the Russians finished the tournament undefeated with a record of 10 – 0 – 0 , becoming the first team to win every game in regulation since the Soviet Union in the 1989 World Championships . The Czech Republic captured the bronze medal by defeating co - host Finland 3 – 2 in the bronze medal game . The tournament ' s top scorer , Russia ' s Evgeni Malkin , was named the most valuable player of the tournament . Host selection . At the IIHF congress in Moscow in 2007 four nations submitted bids to host the 2012 World Championship : Finland , Sweden , the Czech Republic , and Hungary . The Hungarian and Czech bids were withdrawn before the vote , which was then contested by Finland and Sweden . Finland won with 64 votes to Sweden ' s 35 . Sweden later won the vote to host the 2013 World Championship . At the congress in Bern in 2009 it was announced that Finland and Sweden would instead co - host both the 2012 and 2013 tournaments . Venues . Group A preliminary round and quarterfinals were played in Hartwall Areena , Helsinki . Group B preliminary round and quarterfinals were played in Ericsson Globe , Stockholm . All semifinal and medal games were played at the Hartwall Areena . Format . For the first time since 2000 , a new format was adopted in the IIHF World Hockey Championships . The preliminary round and qualification round were merged into one ( two pools of eight teams ) , with the top four teams from each pool advancing to the quarterfinals . Rosters . Each teams roster for the 2012 IIHF World Championship consisted of at least 15 skaters ( forwards , and defencemen ) and 2 goaltender s , and at most 22 skaters and 3 goaltenders . All sixteen participating nations , through the confirmation of their respective national associations , had to submit a roster by the first IIHF directorate meeting . This group saw the three favourites , Canada , the United States and Finland advance pretty easily . All three teams advanced a day before the group play was done . Canada lost just one game , their second game , against the Americans in overtime . The Americans themselves needed to win their last game against Switzerland to capture the second place in the group ahead of Finland and did so with the result being 5 – 2 . For the final spot of advancing , Slovakia and France played in a " final " , where France needed a win to advance to the quarterfinals . The game was close throughout , tied the whole way until it was 4 – 4 , this is when Slovakia scored the final and decisive goal to win 5 – 4 and get to the fourth spot in the group . France , Switzerland were eliminated alongside Belarus , with Kazakhstan finishing in the last spot and being relegated . They ended the tournament with one point , by losing to the United States in overtime . Summary . Preliminary round . Canada faced Slovakia , and the United States played against Finland in the quarterfinals . Russia went through the group undefeated by winning all seven games . Co - host Sweden captured the second place , after falling short to Russia . Czech Republic rounded up the third place and advanced to the quarterfinals . Norway , Latvia and Germany all fought for the last spot in the next round but Germany was eliminated after failing miserably 4 – 12 to Norway . Latvia lost to Denmark and was eliminated , which meant that Norway advanced . Italy finished last and was relegated to Division I . In the quarterfinals , Russia took on Norway , while Sweden battled the Czech Republic . The Slovak team was the underdog going against Team Canada who had lost just one game so far . But the game started with a surprising strong start by Slovakia , who scored twice in the first 10 minutes to get a 2 – 0 lead . Evander Kane was able to cut into the lead before going into the first break . In the second period Canada scored twice and got the lead and Slovakia was down by one going into the last period . With just 6 and a half minutes to go Milan Bartovič tied the game before Michal Handzuš even took the lead with a bit over two minutes to go . Canada pulled the goalie but was not able to connect against and lost 3 – 4 . The crowd was stunned and the surprise perfect , Slovakia advanced to the semifinals while Canada was eliminated . The undefeated russian team added Alexander Semin and Alexander Ovechkin to their roster before the quarterfinals . Quarterfinals . Ovechkin went right away and scored the equalizer after Per - Åge Skrøder gave Norway the lead . After Russia took the lead , Patrick Thoresen made it a tied game just 28 seconds after the second period started , with his 18th point of the tournament . The game went into the last period tied , 2 – 2 . Not even one minute into the third period , Alexei Emelin gave Russia the lead . After Russia raised the lead to two , Ilya Nikulin finished Norway off by making it a 5 – 2 lead with just five minutes to go . Norway was outshot 45 – 21 and eliminated . Co - Host Finland tried to advance against the US - team who they lost to in the preliminary round . The first period ended scoreless , before Jesse Joensuu broke the tie , just to be answered 21 seconds later by Kyle Palmieri . With the game going 1 – 1 into the last period , the United States took the lead with under two minutes played . Mikko Koivu tied the game seven minutes before the end of the game . With everyone expecting a overtime , Jesse Joensuu struck again , just nine seconds before the end . The US pulled the goalie but never had another chance and were eliminated . The last quarterfinals saw Co - host Sweden going up against the Czech team . The first period ended in a 2 – 1 lead for the Czech Republic after Sweden took the lead early on . Martin Erat scored and gave the Czechs a two - goal lead before Henrik Zetterberg cut into the lead 45 seconds before the end of the second period . Jonathan Ericsson continued the Swedish way of climbing back by tying the game just 45 seconds into the last period . Both teams had their chance in the next few minutes , Sweden hit the post and the Czechs failed to score against Viktor Fasth . 29 seconds before the end Michálek took the puck away from swedish defender and scored . Sweden pulled the goalie and had one last chance but it was missed and the Czech advanced to the semifinals . Seven minutes into the game , Janne Niskala gave Finland the lead . Two goals from Evgeni Malkin brought Russia back into the game going into the first intermission . In the second period Alexander Ovechkin increased the lead to 3 – 1 ; a while later Malkin would increase Russia ' s lead to 4 – 1 . Denis Kokarev then scored another goal and with Russia in control of the game , yet another after that . Four minutes before the end of the game Mikael Granlund scored the last goal of the game , as it ended 6 – 2 in favour of Russia although they were out - shot 23 to 31 . Malkin was the player of the game with scoring a hatrick to give him 18 points for the tournament . Russia advanced to the final to try to win their twenty - sixth title , while Finland will battle for bronze . The Slovak team tried to continue their ride at this championship by advancing to the final even though the Czech team was the favorite before the game started . The game started slow , but Miroslav Šatan broke the tie 15 minutes into the game to give Slovakia the lead . Another 15 minutes in , this time the second period , Michael Frolík made it a 1 – 1 game going into in the last period . The third period was not more than one minute old , when Šatan struck again with his second goal , despite Slovakia being shorthanded . Libor Hudáček then gave Slovakia a two - goal lead four minutes later . The Czech team had 15 minutes to turn the game around but did not create enough opportunities . They pulled their goaltender with two minutes to go , but Slovakia kept up their defense well enough not to concede another goal . Slovakia finished off another upset and advanced to the final , while the Czech Republic plays in the bronze medal game . Slovakia had no penalties but was outshot by nine . Bronze medal game . The bronze medal game featured Finland and the Czech Republic . The Czechs took the lead in the first period before Finland tied the game at one , three minutes before the first break . Jiří Novotný and David Krejčí raised the lead to two goals , being 3 – 1 at the first intermission . The second period went scoreless before the Finnish team got new hope when Jussi Jokinen scored a goal ten minutes before the end of the game . But they did not score again , and the Czech team captured the bronze medal and Finland ended the tournament in fourth place . Gold medal game . The gold medal game featured Russia and Slovakia . Slovakia played in the World Championship final game for the first time since 2002 , while Russia advanced to their fourth gold medal game in the last five years . Russia defeated Slovakia 6 – 2 to take home the gold medal from the tournament . The Russian team went through the tournament undefeated . Nations . The following 16 nations qualified for the elite - pool tournament . 13 nations from Europe , 2 nations from North America and 1 nation from Asia are represented . Officials . The IIHF selected 16 referees and 16 linesmen to work the 2012 IIHF World Championship . They were the following : Seeding and groups . The seeding in the preliminary round was based on the 2011 IIHF World Ranking , which ended at the conclusion of the 2011 IIHF World Championship . The teams were grouped accordingly by seeding ( in parenthesis is the corresponding world ranking ) : Group H ( Helsinki ) Group S ( Stockholm ) Preliminary round . The top four teams in each group moved to the quarterfinals where the group winner met the fourth place , and the group runner - up met the third place within the same group . The last placed team in each group was relegated to Division I , Group A . Ranking and statistics . Final standings . The official IIHF final standings of the tournament : Scoring leaders . List shows the top skaters sorted by points , then goals . If the list exceeds 10 skaters because of a tie in points , all of the tied skaters are shown . Leading goaltenders . Only the top five goaltenders , based on save percentage , who have played 40 % of their team ' s minutes , are included in this list . IIHF broadcasting rights . Over 100 countries broadcast the matches , live or near - live transmissions , of the 2012 tournament .