Ice hockey at the 2018 Winter Olympics – Men's tournament

The men's tournament in ice hockey at the 2018 Winter Olympics will be held in Gangneung, South Korea between 14 and 25 February 2018. Twelve countries qualified for the tournament; eight of them did so automatically by virtue of their ranking by the International Ice Hockey Federation, one, South Korea, automatically qualified as hosts, while the three others took part in a qualification tournament.

After five consecutive Olympic tournaments in which the National Hockey League (the world's premier professional league) allowed its players to participate in the Olympics and adjusted its schedule to accommodate the tournament, the NHL announced in 2017 that it would prohibit any player under NHL contract, including those not actually playing for an NHL team, from participating in the Olympics. The NHL secured the cooperation of the International Ice Hockey Federation and the IOC ensuring that nations would not be allowed to ask NHL players to participate.

Unlike the NHL, a vast majority of European leagues will accommodate an Olympic break, headlined by Russia-based KHL's 33-days break, Sweden-based Swedish Hockey League's 14-days break, Switzerland-based National League's 25-days break, German-based Deutsche Eishockey Liga's 26-days break, Czech Republic-based Extraliga's 18-days break and Slovakia-based Tipsport liga's 14-days break. Conversely, Finland-based SM-liiga will not accommodate a break, but will allow its top players to leave their clubs and participate in the Olympics.

Qualified teams

 * 1 In December 2017, the IOC suspended Russia from competing at the Winter Olympics as part of its sanctions following state-sponsored doping allegations. Russian athletes with no history of doping violations, including the men's ice hockey squad, were permitted to compete as neutrals under the name "Olympic Athletes from Russia"

Ranking after preliminary round
Following the completion of the preliminary round, all teams will be ranked 1D through 12D. To determine this ranking, the following criteria will be used in the order presented:
 * 1) higher position in the group
 * 2) higher number of points
 * 3) better goal difference
 * 4) higher number of goals scored for
 * 5) better 2017 IIHF World Ranking.

Statistics

 * Note: Players are ranked by points and then alphabetically though nation and then surname.