by Michael Fox

Created on: November 22, 2011

Every sport has a number of countries that are more prominent in them. Football has mostly American players while baseball has players from not only the United States but also from Latin America, Japan and Canada.

The same can be said for the National Hockey League. There are several places that players have come from over the years. These countries show just how international the game of hockey is.

Note: The statistics are from NHL.com, the official website of the NHL. The site has details on every single player who has ever played in the NHL. It is also very easy to search for and includes players from 1917 to the present day and even from defunct teams like the Brooklyn Americans and Oakland Seals. Hockey-reference.com also helped in this report.

Canada is by far the most notable place for players in the NHL. The league has 408 Canadian players going around in the 2011-12 season and a total of 10,069 Canadians in NHL history.

The number of players from the Soviet Union is an interesting point to see. Any player who is in the league now and was born in Russia or any other former Soviet country is technically originally from the Soviet Union if that player was born when that nation was still around. 226 players are from the Soviet Union. Meanwhile, there are 556 players who state that they are from Russia to have played in the NHL.

The stats involving Czechoslovakia are also notable. Some players tend to prefer to list themselves based on whether they are from the Czech Republic or Slovakia. There are 556 Czech players in NHL history with 41 of them playing now. This is compared to 165 Slovakian players with 11 in the league now.

Of course, the United States has produced a large number of players. 3,305 Americans have played with 168 in the league now.

Sweden is the most prominent Scandinavian country in the NHL. 59 Swedes are in the league right now while there are only 25 from Finland. Sweden has produced a total of 555 players.

Interestingly enough, anyone can come from anywhere and still play in the NHL. The players tend to be Canadian, American Soviet/Russian or European but there have been cases where players have come from other spots in the world. For example, only two South Africans, including former Washington Capitals goalie Olaf Kolzig, have played in the league. Willi Plett, who played in the 1980s for the Calgary Flames and Minnesota North Stars, is the only player from Paraguay in NHL history. There have also been only two players from Nigeria in the NHL. Current Winnipeg Jets forward Akim Aliu is one of the two.

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