With the deciding of the Finnish Liiga championship, the rankings for the 2016-17 CHL Group Stage Draw are complete and the seeding is now known.

Press Release

With Tappara Tampere winning the Finnish Liiga championship on Tuesday night, all national leagues that participate in the Champions Hockey League have been determined. Based on this fact, the CHL has generated its final rankings ahead of the Group Stage Draw on 3 May in Zurich and allocated the 48 teams to three pots.

The national champions of the six CHL Founding Leagues are the top ranked and seeded teams. As champions of Sweden, CHL Champions Frolunda Gothenburg lead the ranking, followed by the champions of Finland, the Czech Republic, Switzerland, Germany and Austria in the top six.

• Sweden: Reigning CHL Champions Frolunda won their first national title in 11 years on Sunday after an impressive overall season.

• Finland: Tappara Tampere were crowned national champion on Tuesday for the first time since 2003.

• Czech Republic: Bili Tygri Liberec lifted up their first ever Czech Extraliga championship trophy.

• Switzerland: As lowest-seeded team in the NLA playoffs, SC Bern became Swiss national champions, collecting their 14th national title.

• Austria: Red Bull Salzburg defended their title, making it a total of 6 EBEL titles in their short club history (founded in 2000).

• Germany: Red Bull Munich won their first national championship ever.

CHL Group Stage Draw: Pot Allocation

According to the CHL Ranking and with respect to a special regulation for the 2016-17 CHL Group Stage Draw, which states that teams from leagues where their respective national teams are participating in the final Olympic qualification tournament cannot be drawn into the same group.

Draw Rules

• There will be 16 pots with three teams each.

• Pot 1: Teams ranked 1–16 | Pot 2: Teams ranked 17–32 | Pot 3: Teams ranked 33–48; the CHL ranking tool applies.

• The Draw will provide 16 groups of 3 teams each.

• Clubs from the same league cannot be drawn into the same group (note: Orli Znojmo is considered an EBEL team and can be drawn against teams from the Czech Extraliga).

• Teams from nations participating in the Olympic qualification tournament cannot be drawn against each other.

• Software will help us detect any potential conflict. Should such a conflict occur then the software will determine the next possible group available. The club in question will then be placed into this available group.

Group Stage Draw & 2016-17 format

The format for the 2016-17 Champions Hockey League remains the same as 2015-16. 48 teams compete on the “Destination Final” to be crown as Europe’s club champion. 26 A-License (Founding Clubs) clubs are joined by 12 B-License (in principle the national champions and regular season winners of the six Founding Leagues) and 10 C-License clubs. 

The Group Stage Draw takes places on 3 May in Zurich, Switzerland and will be streamed live on ChampionsHockeyLeague.net, starting at 12:00 CET.

The Group Stage of the 2016-17 season will begin on 18 August (16 August for Swiss teams) and finish on 11 September. The total of 48 teams will be divided into 16 groups of three and each team will play four games – one home and one away against the other two teams in its group. The first- and second-placed teams in each group will then advance to the Playoff Stage.

With 32 teams in the playoffs, five rounds will be required to determine the European club champion. The first four rounds will all be two-game, home-and-away, total-goal series, similar to the previous seasons. The playoffs will begin on 4 October and finish with a one-game Final on 7 February.