2014–15 Hockeyettan season
| 2014–15 Hockeyettan season | |
|---|---|
| League | Hockeyettan |
| Sport | Ice hockey |
| Duration | 21 September 2014 – 4 April 2015 |
| Number of teams | 47 |
The 2014–15 Hockeyettan season was the 16th season that Hockeyettan (up until this season referred to mainly as Division 1) has functioned as the third tier of ice hockey in Sweden, organized by the Swedish Ice Hockey Association (SIHA). The initial groups began on 21 September 2014 and ended on 10 December 2014. The following Allettan groups and continuation groups started on 27 December 2014 and finished on 15 February 2015. The promotion playoffs to the HockeyAllsvenskan qualifier began on 19 February 2015 and ended on 6–7 March 2015. The Hockeyettan qualifiers began on 1 March 2015 and ended on 25 March 2015. The HockeyAllsvenskan qualifier began on 12 March 2015 and ended on 4 April 2015.
The 2014–15 Hockeyettan season will feature 47 teams divided into four geographical groups: Norra ("North"), Östra ("East"), Västra ("West"), and Södra ("South"). This is a contraction compared to the previous season, which featured 53 teams divided into five groups. With the exception of Hockeyettan North which will have 11 teams, each of the groups will consist of 12 teams. At the end of the groups in December, the top four teams in each of the Hockeyettan North and Hockeyettan East groups will qualify for the Allettan Norra group, and the top four teams in each of the Hockeyettan West and Hockeyettan South groups will qualify for the Allettan Södra group, after Christmas. Meanwhile, the remaining teams in each starting group will continue playing in their starting group ("continuation group") after Christmas. In the continuation groups, the teams will be given extra points dependent on their ranking in their initial group; the lowest-ranked team gets 0 points, the second-lowest-ranked team gets 1 point, the third-lowest-ranked team gets 2 points, and so on. The two Allettan winners will go directly to the 2015 HockeyAllsvenskan qualifier (Swedish: Kvalserien till HockeyAllsvenskan), which determines promotion to the second-tier league HockeyAllsvenskan. The top two teams in each of the four continuation groups, as well as the teams ranked 2–5 in each of the two Allettan groups, will qualify for the promotion playoffs, which are played in three rounds—PlayOff 1, 2, and 3—and battle to reach the HockeyAllsvenskan qualifier. Each playoff team will start in PlayOff 1, unlike previous seasons where a certain team's placement in their spring group affected whether that team started in PlayOff 1, 2 or 3. The worst-ranked team in the Norra continuation group, and the two worst-ranked teams in each of the three other continuation groups, will have to play in the Hockeyettan qualifier round-robin tournament (Swedish: Kvalserien till Hockeyettan) for their region to avoid relegation to Division 2, the fourth-tier league. In each of the four Hockeyettan qualifiers, the Hockeyettan team(s) will face four of the best teams from the four Division 2 regions. The North Hockeyettan team will face all four teams from Division 2 North; the East Hockeyettan teams will face two teams from Division 2 East, one from Division 2 West and one from Division 2 South; the West Hockeyettan teams will face two teams from Division 2 West, one from Division 2 East and one from Division 2 South; and the Hockeyettan South teams will face two teams from Division 2 South, one from Division 2 East and one from Division 2 West. Per the 2014–15 season format, only the top-ranked team from each of the four qualifiers will be guaranteed a spot in Hockeyettan for the 2015–16 season. The two remaining playoff teams after PlayOff 3 will join the two Allettan winners and the two lowest-ranked teams in HockeyAllsvenskan in the 2015 HockeyAllsvenskan qualifier, where the teams will play a double round-robin tournament and battle for four spots in HockeyAllsvenskan for the 2015–16 season. The remaining teams in the Allettan groups and the continuation groups will remain in Hockeyettan for the 2015–16 season. All groups that are formed in the season, including the initial ones and the qualifiers for HockeyAllsvenskan and Hockeyettan, will be played as double round-robins, with each team playing the other teams in their group once at home and once on the road.
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