The NHL season opens this week. But not every player gets to battle for professional hockey's most coveted trophy – the Stanley Cup. In fact, in most places around the world, ice hockey is a mere afterthought, with leagues and national teams operating in relative obscurity.
The International Ice Hockey Federation (IIHF) is hockey's international governing body. It counts 49 full-time national teams, most of whom you wouldn't associate with the cold-weather sport. Some of these teams are pretty good. And some of them have been around a lot longer than you realize – if you realized they even existed at all.