| MoDo Hockey | |
|---|---|
 | |
| City | Örnsköldsvik,Sweden |
| League | SHL |
| Founded | 27 March 1921 |
| Home arena | Hägglunds Arena (capacity: 7,265) |
| Colors | Red, white, green |
| General manager | Henrik Gradin |
| Head coach | Mattias Karlin |
| Captain | David Rundblad |
| Website | modohockey.se |
| Franchise history | |
| 1921–1963 | Alfredshems IK |
| 1964–86 | MoDo AIK |
| 1987–present | MoDo Hockey |
| Championships | |
| Le Mat Trophy | 1979,2007 |
Modo Hockey (orMoDo with uppercase letters) is a professionalice hockey club inÖrnsköldsvik,Sweden. The team currently plays in Sweden's first-tier leagueSHL after having won promotion fromHockeyAllsvenskan following the 2022/23 season. The club was founded in 1987 and has won one title, the SHL championships, in2007. The team's home arena since 2006 is theHägglunds Arena (previously known asFjällräven Center andSwedbank Arena). Before then, the team played atKempehallen, beginning in 1964.[1]
The club was founded on 27 March 1921 as Alfredshems IK, however it existed without an ice hockey program until 1938.[1] Twenty years later, in 1958, the club joinedHockeyallsvenskan, Sweden's highest division at the time.[1] Alfredshems IK played under that name until 1963,[1] when it was renamed Modo AIK after their main sponsor, industrial corporationMo och Domsjö AB (commonly abbreviated MoDo). The following year, the club made the newly constructedKempehallen their home arena.[1] In 1975, Modo AIK joined theElitserien as one of the premier league's original ten teams. Four seasons later, Modo AIK won their first regular-season championship in 1979, en route to defeating previous ten-time championDjurgårdens IF to also capture their firstLe Mat trophy as playoff champions.
In 1987, Modo AIK dropped the "AIK" suffix to the club's name, becoming known simply as Modo Hockey. After coming off its championship year in 1979, the club spent the majority of the 1980s with losing records.[2] Coming out of the club'sjunior program, however, hometown starsPeter Forsberg andMarkus Näslund played their rookie seasons with the senior team in 1990–91. Näslund went on to lead Modo Hockey in scoring as an eighteen-year-old in his second season with the club,[3] while Forsberg became the first Modo player to win theGuldpucken as Swedish player of the year sinceNils Johansson in 1964, capturing the title back-to-back in 1993 and 1994.
With both Forsberg and Näslund having been chosen as first-round selections in the1991 NHL Entry Draft, however, their time in Sweden was limited. Näslund departed for the NHL in 1993, while Forsberg remained to lead Modo to their second Elitserien playoff final in 1994, where they lost toMalmö IF. Soon after Forsberg's inevitable departure to the NHL in 1995,identical twin brothersDaniel andHenrik Sedin represented the next wave of young talent coming through the Modo system. At seventeen-years-old, they captured the Guldpucken together as co-recipients in 1999, while leading Modo to a 33-win season (in a 50-game schedule) for the club's second regular-season title. As second- and third-overall selections in the1999 NHL Entry Draft, respectively, Daniel and Henrik left Modo for the NHL in 2000. Regardless, Modo became consistent contenders for the Le Mat trophy, appearing in three out of four playoff finals – losing all three – between 1999 and 2002.
Due to the2004–05 NHL lockout, many former Modo stars returned to the team from the NHL, including Forsberg, Näslund, the Sedins andFrantišek Kaberle. Several foreign NHL players also signed with Modo, includingCanadian defencemanAdrian Aucoin andAmerican forwardDan Hinote. Swedish goaltenderTommy Salo (a product ofVIK Västerås HK) joined as the starting goaltender. Despite a bolstered lineup, Modo finished sixth in the regular season.[4]
Having played inKempehallen as their home arena since 1964, Modo moved into the then newly constructedSwedbank Arena, which was partially funded by former star Forsberg and his father Kent, who was also a former club head coach.[5] Modo returned to Elitserien supremacy that season, defeatingLinköpings HC on April 14, 2007, to capture their second Le Mat trophy in franchise history. The championship-winning club featured the 2007 Guldpucken-recipientPer Svartvadet, team leading-scorerPer-Åge Skrøder and future NHL defencemanTobias Enström. The return ofNiklas Sundström, who had originally played with the club alongside Forsberg and Näslund in the early 1990s, bolstered Modo's roster as he finished second in team scoring in his first season back from the NHL.[6] An approximate 8,000 fans were in attendance at the Swedbank Arena for Modo's first championship in 28 years.[5]
In the 2008–09 season the team finished ninth in Elitserien, thus missing the playoffs. In the2009–10 season, Forsberg returned to play for Modo on a conditioning-basis to prepare for an anticipated return to the NHL after having been inactive for a season due to injury. With Näslund back in Sweden, having retired after the2008–09 NHL season, he correctly predicted that Forsberg would not return to the NHL and finish the season with Modo instead.[7] Several days later, on November 17, 2009, Näslund announced he was coming out of retirement to also rejoin Modo with Forsberg. The announcement crashed the Modo web server as a result of the heavy volume of people visiting the site. As a board member of the club, Näslund also announced he would play without a salary, along with Forsberg.[8] Despite Näslund's and Forsberg's return to Modo, the team finished ninth and thus missed the playoffs for the second consecutive year. After the 2009–10 season, Näslund retired again, and Forsberg left Modo again. After Näslund's second retirement, he was named thegeneral manager of Modo.
In the2010–11 season the team were closer to relegation toHockeyAllsvenskan than since 1990. The team finished last in Elitserien after a very tight battle in the bottom of Elitserien and thus were forced to play inKvalserien for the first time since 1990 (the team survived the 1990 Kvalserien). After the2011 Kvalserien's ninth round, Modo andSödertälje both had 17 points. Modo and Södertälje met each other inFjällräven Center in the final round, for a game that directly decided which team would be relegated to HockeyAllsvenskan. Modo won the game 2–0 and thus stayed in Elitserien for the2011–12 season. Nearly two weeks later,Peter Forsberg was named an assistant general manager of the Modo organization.[9] Just a day later, on April 21, 2011, Modo Hockey's thenhead coachCharles "Challe" Berglund was forced to leave the club.[10]
On May 2, 2011,Ulf Samuelsson, who had been an assistant coach in theNational Hockey League (NHL), was named the head coach of Modo Hockey,[11] a position he held for two seasons.[12][13]
During the2012–13 Riksserien season,Modo finished first in the regular season, but were eliminated in the semifinals byBrynäs IF.
Although Örnsköldsvik is a small town with an approximate population of just 29,000, the city has produced numerous born-and-raised NHL talents through the Modo system. The hockey-centred town has six indoor rinks, with the Hägglunds Arena boasting regular attendances of 7,000 for Modo home games, marking nearly a quarter of the population.[5]
Anders Hedberg was one of the first Swedes to succeed in the NHL, in the 1970s. In the early 1990s, forwardsPeter Forsberg andMarkus Näslund emerged from Modo's junior system and were drafted 6th and 16th overall by thePhiladelphia Flyers andPittsburgh Penguins, respectively in the1991 NHL Entry Draft. They became arguably Modo's first NHL stars. Forsberg went on to win theCalder Memorial Trophy as NHL rookie of the year in1995 with the Nordiques and theHart Memorial Trophy as NHL MVP with theColorado Avalanche in2003, while Näslund won theLester B. Pearson Award as NHL MVP chosen by the players in 2003. Furthermore, Forsberg and Näslund finished first and second in league point-scoring for theArt Ross Trophy in 2003. Besides the two league-leaders, the 2002–03 season featured 13 NHL players originating from Modo, as well as seven others who were born and raised within a couple miles of Örnsköldsvik.[5] ForwardNiklas Sundström also played alongside Forsberg and Näslund with Modo and was drafted 8th overall in the1993 NHL Entry Draft by theNew York Rangers.
Eight years after Forsberg and Näslund's draft selections, identical twinsDaniel andHenrik Sedin were drafted second and third overall, joining Näslund in Vancouver. In2005–06, Näslund, Henrik and Daniel finished first, second and third, respectively, in Canucks team-scoring.[14] In fact, from the1998–99 season until the2016-17 season, no Canucks player hasled the team in scoring besides either Näslund, Henrik or Daniel. During the2009–10 season, Henrik became the second former Modo player to win the NHL'sArt Ross Trophy as the league's leading scorer and theHart Memorial Trophy as league MVP. The next year fellow Canuck and twin brother Daniel Sedin would go on to win the Art ross trophy making it the first time in NHL history that two brothers won scoring titles consecutively.
In2008–09 defencemanVictor Hedman began drawing considerable attention from the NHL and was eventually selected second overall in the2009 NHL Entry Draft by theTampa Bay Lightning, matching Daniel Sedin as the highest-drafted Modo player in team history.
Victor Olofsson found success with theBuffalo Sabres upon joining the team in 2019, becoming a permanent member of the team in the2019–20 season.
This is a partial list of the last nine seasons completed by Modo. For the full season-by-season history, seeList of Modo Hockey seasons. Code explanation;GP—Games played,W—Wins,L—Losses,T—Tied games,GF—Goals for,GA—Goals against,Pts—Points. Top Scorer:Points (Goals+Assists)
| Season | League | Regular season | Post season results | ||||||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Finish | GP | W | L | T | GF | GA | Pts | Top scorer | |||
| 2009–10 | Elitserien | 9th | 55 | 16 | 20 | 19 | 161 | 150 | 74 |  M. Zuccarello64 (23+41) | Did not qualify |
| 2010–11 | Elitserien | 12th | 55 | 17 | 25 | 13 | 147 | 153 | 70 |  B. Ritchie44 (23+21) | Saved in relegation series (Kvalserien) |
| 2011–12 | Elitserien | 8th | 55 | 19 | 22 | 6 | 146 | 147 | 79 |  N. Danielsson53 (21+31) | Lost in quarterfinals, 2–4 (Skellefteå AIK) |
| 2012–13 | Elitserien | 7th | 55 | 19 | 19 | 17 | 135 | 129 | 81 | P.Å. Skröder35 (16+19) | Lost in quarterfinals, 1–4 (Färjestad BK) |
| 2013–14 | SHL | 8th | 55 | 18 | 20 | 17 | 131 | 132 | 81 | K. Cumiskey28 (4+24) | Lost in play in, 0–2 (Linköpings HC) |
| 2014–15 | SHL | 12th | 55 | 12 | 30 | 13 | 127 | 176 | 53 | P.Å. Skröder25 (14+11) | Saved in relegation series (SHL qualifiers) |
| 2015–16 | SHL | 13th | 52 | 13 | 32 | 7 | 119 | 166 | 49 | V. Olofsson29 (14+15) | Relegated, lost play-off series 3–4 (Leksands IF) |
| 2016–17 | HockeyAllsvenskan | 12th | 52 | 16 | 25 | 11 | 133 | 155 | 66 | H. Björklund39 (20+19) | Did not qualify |
| 2017–18 | HockeyAllsvenskan | 10th | 52 | 19 | 25 | 8 | 134 | 123 | 72 | E. Molin51 (23+28) | Did not qualify |
| 2018–19 | HockeyAllsvenskan | 6th | 52 | 24 | 18 | 10 | 143 | 134 | 86 | P. Karlkvist42 (20+22) | 4th in the playoff series |
| 2019–20 | HockeyAllsvenskan | 2nd | 52 | 35 | 12 | 5 | 205 | 130 | 111 | J. Johnson79 (29+50) | Hockeyallsvenskan Final, (IF Björklöven) |
| 2020–21 | HockeyAllsvenskan | 12th | 52 | 15 | 25 | 12 | 150 | 185 | 63 | P. Karlkvist45 (19+26) | Did not qualify |
| 2021–22 | HockeyAllsvenskan | 2nd | 52 | 26 | 10 | 16 | 182 | 140 | 106 | R. Woods49 (26+23) | Lost in semifinals, 3–4 (IF Björklöven) |
| 2022–23 | HockeyAllsvenskan | 1st | 52 | 31 | 9 | 12 | 178 | 124 | 109 | D. Bernhardt51 (19+32) | Promoted, Win in finals 4–3 (Djurgårdens IF) |
| 2023–24 | SHL | 11th | 52 | 15 | 23 | 14 | 130 | 162 | 67 | R. Woods36 (15+21) | Did not qualify |
| 2024–25 | SHL | ||||||||||
Updated 15 February 2025.
| No. | Player | Position | Career |
|---|---|---|---|
| 3 | Mattias Timander | D | 1993–1996, 2004–2011 |
| 4 | Nils Johansson | D | 1958–1970 |
| 8 | Per Lundqvist | LW | 1968–1983 |
| 9 | Magnus Wernblom | RW | 1990–2004, 2007–2009 |
| 16 | Anders Hedberg | RW | 1967–1972 |
| 21 | Peter Forsberg | C | 1990–1995, 2004–2005, 2009–2010 |
| 39 | Per Svartvadet | C | 1992–1999, 2003–2011 |
|
|
|
|
|
| Awards and achievements | ||
|---|---|---|
| Preceded by | Swedish ice hockey champions 1979 | Succeeded by |
| Preceded by | Swedish ice hockey champions 2007 | Succeeded by |
