The Fall of An Empire: How The NHL’s Player Base is Shifting Away From Canadian Dominance

A half-century ago, Europeans were a novelty in the NHL, but they’ve seen their impact on the league grow significantly. However, the story has varied significantly by country.

For instance, Finland’s contribution to the NHL has grown relatively steadily without many fits and starts. From the first time there were 25 Finns in the NHL (1999-00) to 2017-18, the country’s NHL skaters numbered between 25 and 36 each season. There has been a slight growth in the last few seasons, but the country’s small population (5.62 million) limits its ability to dominate the league.

Sweden has a similar story, although its contingent of NHL skaters has increased slightly in recent years. In 2019-20, it became the first individual European country to contribute 100 skaters to the NHL, and almost one-tenth of all skaters over the past 10 seasons hail from the country. There doesn’t appear to be an obvious inciting event for the country’s recent growth, but it can track the beginning of its current path to pioneer and superstar Borje Salming’s arrival in the NHL in the early 70s.

Czechia has a more complicated history. It took longer than Sweden and Finland to develop, and it first produced 10 NHL skaters in 1988-89. However, between 1994-95 and 2003-04, it eclipsed both nations.

The Czechs had something special going on in the 1990s, producing that decade’s top scorer (Jaromir Jagr) and arguably its best goaltender (Dominik Hasek) and winning the first Olympic gold in a tournament with NHL player participation (1998). 

However, hockey has declined significantly in the country, and so far this NHL season, there have been just 21 Czech skaters, a far cry from the 71 the league had at the nation’s height in 2001-02.

Russian participation in the NHL has also had a rollercoaster trajectory. During the Cold War years, Russian-born players were a non-factor in the league, but the 1989-90 season saw eight come over the NHL and make an instant impact. There was an immediate influx after that:

There wasn’t a surge from that point, though. Fewer Russian players have appeared so far in 2024-25 (53) than in 1993-94. Several factors contributed to that lack of growth, including the emergence of the KHL in 2008. 

The pattern in the chart above is similar to what we see with skaters but even more dramatic.

The Canada-US Dynamic

Once again, Canada is declining while the United States is on the rise, although in this case, Canada falls further from the top, and the US's progress is more linear.

These numbers match the recent concern about Canada’s lack of elite goaltending options for the upcoming 4 Nations Faceoff. The country has fallen off significantly after producing most of the NHL’s goalies for so long.

Meanwhile, the United States continues to produce more goaltenders. Between 1974-75 and 2014-15, 20 or more American goaltenders appeared in the NHL just once (2005-06). That threshold has been crossed in seven of the last ten seasons, and if one more arrives at the end of the 2024-25 season, that number will be eight.

What about the Europeans?

European goaltenders were extremely rare until the mid-90s but have recently become mainstays. Many trends with these goalies mirror those of skaters, but two notable exceptions exist.

The first is that Finland has deservedly earned its reputation as a goaltender factory. Despite having significantly fewer skaters than neighboring Sweden, there have been 21 more Finn goaltenders than Swedes since 1984-85. The country has also produced three Vezina winners in the salary-cap era (since 2005-06): Mikka Kiprusoff, Tuukka Rask, and Pekka Rinne. Sweden has one (Linus Ullmark). 

Another notable trend is the rise of Russian goaltenders at a time when the country’s number of skaters in the NHL remains fairly flat.

The surge in Russian goaltending goes beyond quantity, too, as the nation has recently produced elite goalies, including a two-time Vezina winner and Stanley Cup champion (Sergei Bobrovsky), a one-time Vezina winner and two-time Stanely Cup champion (Andrei Vasilevskiy), and a player who just got the largest contract ever for the position (Igor Shesterkin).

The most straightforward answer is that Canada’s hold over the NHL is slipping, even if it remains the top source of players, and the United States is closing the gap. A recent RG poll shows that the public expectation is that the USA will become the world’s dominant hockey power in the years to come.

It’s not outlandish to think that someday there might be more Americans than Canadians in the league, but that’s not a sure thing either. The stories of Czechia and Russia tell us that ebbs and flows are possible here, and what looks like an approaching golden age for American hockey may be a peak.

Regardless of how that develops in the years to come, it seems safe to predict that the days of the vast majority of NHL players hailing from Canada aren’t coming back. There is simply too much talent south of the border and across the Atlantic Ocean. 

With the NHL continuing to explore non-traditional markets — like the United Kingdom for the Premiere Series in 2007 or Australia for the Global Series in 2023 — it’s possible that in the decades to come, we’ll see NHLers from places in the world that would seem far-fetched today.