Greece will field its national ice hockey team again.
Då blev Stockholmaren Nikiforos Xanthopoulos, 20, scoutad — via Elite Prospects.
—a bit unexpected, but an incredible honor to be part of the journey from the very beginning, he says.
Nikiforos Xanthopoulos has both a Swedish and a Greek flag to his name on the stats Eliteprospects.com.
This prompted the Hellenic Ice Hockey Federation to contact the two-meter, 100-kilogram defender who played second-tier hockey with Trångsunds IF last season.
– They contacted me via Instagram and asked if I wanted to share a cup, says Nikiforos Xanthopoulos, who has a Greek father.
We’ll come back to the mug, but there’s a little background description. Greece no longer has an official national team.
– They’ve had a national ice hockey team at a lower level before. But due to the lack of a suitable Olympic-sized ice rink, the national team was disqualified in 2012. Now the plan is to create a new national team. So technically I will be playing for a team called the “Greek Heritage Ice Hockey Team”, which unofficially represents Greece.
“incredible honor”
The above-mentioned cup is called “Amerigol Latam Cup” and it takes place in Florida, USA, at the end of August. Many of Nikiforou’s colleagues live in Canada or the United States and are of Greek descent.
– The Cup is played at the Florida Panthers’ training facilities. We’ll meet some of the other teams about to start a national ice hockey team, Nico explains, which include countries like Mexico, Egypt, Venezuela, and Jamaica.
How did you feel when they reached out?
– Not real. It is an incredible honor to represent the Greek side of the family. I am the only one in my family who represents any national team. So it’s great to write my name in history one way or another. Especially in sports.
Nikiforos ser det som en unique chans.
– Although I was born and raised in Sweden, I spend my summers in Greece, and I have family there. We usually go to my grandma and grandpa’s every year and I consider it my second home.
What is the extent of ice hockey knowledge in Greece?
– Many people still know what ice hockey is. At least the people I talk to when I’m there to explain what I’m doing. They have seen a little bit on the Internet, but they are not familiar. But the point is, we have to pique interest now. The plan is for an ice rink to be built there and we want some form of league to be built there as well.
Want to do like Spain and Italy
Nikiforos says the hope is to become an official Greek national team in one to two years. The aim is to make a similar journey as Spain and Italy have done in the national team hierarchy. Under the top division, where Tre Kronor resides, leagues are divided from Division One to Division Four.
The fourth division is for teams on their way to the top, a little bit like us. The hope, depending on how things go initially, is that we’ll be in Division One or Two in seven years.
The Florida Summer Cup is a good show.
– It will be good publicity for us. It’s also a good way for us to be able to show the results to the Hellenic Winter Sports Federation, that we have the ability to move forward with this. This means that they have more confidence in us and then we can, for example, play another cup next year. After that, the idea is that we should be able to play officially under the supervision of the International Ice Hockey Federation, says Nikiforos Xanthopoulos.
