Viktor Tikhonov
Victor Vasilevich Tikhonov (; born
June 4 1930) is a prominent
Russian
ice hockey player and coach. He was the coach of the
Soviet team when it was one of the strongest in the world.
Victor Tikhonov was born on
June 4,
1930.
*He became a
Soviet Sports Master in
1950,
Latvian merited sports coach (ZTR SSSR) in
1973,
Soviet Merited sports coach (ZTR SSSR) in
1978.
*He is in the
IIHF Hall of fame (builder,1998).
Tikhonov played as a defender with the
VVS (Team of the Soviet Air Forces) and
Dynamo Moscow. He scored 35 goals in 296 games in the Soviet elite hockey league in 1949-63. As a player he won four gold medals of the Soviet national championship (three times with
VVS (
1951-
1953) and once with Dynamo, 1954). He won the USSR Cup in
1952 as a member of
VVS.
His coaching career started in
1964 when he became an assistant coach for Dynamo Moscow, then he took the position of the Head Coach for
Dynamo Riga. In
1977 he became the Head Coach for both
CSKA (
Central Sport Club of the Army or the
Red Army Club as it was known in USA and Canada), Moscow and the Soviet National Team. He was the National Team coach until
1992. As the coach he has won:
*Soviet elite league gold
1978-
1989*World Championship gold in
1978-
1979,
1981-
1983,
1986,
1989,
1990*
Olympics gold of
1984,
1988,
1992.
*
1979 Challenge Cup and
1981 Canada Cup.
Currently Viktor Tikhonov retired but continued lobbying the Russian Government for more attention and better financing for the National Ice Hockey team.
Viktor's son Vasily Viktorovich Tikhonov is also a professional ice hockey coach, he worked in
Finland but has recently moved to
Toronto,
Canada .
