This week in Kazakhstan, Asia’s top four hockey nations will gather for the second edition of the IIHF Ice Hockey Asia Women’s Championship.

Officially, the tournament is part of the 2026 IIHF season. All games will be held at Boris Alexandrov Sport Palace in Oskemen, the largest city in Eastern Kazakhstan and the historic heart of Kazakh hockey.

Teams will play each other one time in a single round-robin format from 5-8 November 2025.

All games will be streamed on IIHF.tv.

Here is the game schedule. All times are local (UTC+5).

Wednesday, 5 November 2025
16:00 | CHN vs KOR 
19:30 | KAZ vs JPN

Friday, 7 November 2025
14:00 | JPN vs KOR
17:30 | CHN vs KAZ

Saturday, 8 November 2025
14:00 | JPN vs CHN
17:30 | KOR vs KAZ

Live scores and results will be available on IIHF.com.

The Asia Women’s Championship is part of a four-year pilot project. The IIHF has collaborated with the national federations of China, Japan, Kazakhstan, and Korea to stage tournaments for senior men and women during the November international break, with the goal of enhancing hockey development in Asia. This follows previous tournaments organized by the IIHF in the region. More details can be found at this link: https://www.iihf.com/en/static/5456/asia 

At the tournament’s debut in Beijing in 2025, Team Japan dominated, winning its three games by a combined score of 25-0.

With four goals and eight points, Japan’s Rui Ukita led all scorers in the tournament. Her teammates Rio Noro and Kohane Sato were right behind with seven points each. Goaltenders Riko Kawaguchi and Miyuu Masuhara shared Japan’s tournament-opening shutout against Korea, splitting the game evenly. Then, Kawaguchi played the full game against Kazakhstan and Masuhara finished off against China.

Ukita, Noro and Sato are all on the roster for this year's tournament, while Masuhara will share the net with Kiku Kobayashi. Japan is coached once again by Yuji Iizuka, who has led the program since 2018.

The team from China finished second last year, shutting out Kazakhstan and Korea before dropping a 5-0 decision to Japan in the tournament finale. China's leading scorer was Baiwei Yu, with four assists. Veteran Mengying Zhang and 17-year-old Biyang Zhang scored two goals each. Goalies Yuqing Wang and Guimin Lai each picked up one shutout, with Wang receiving the daunting assignment of facing Japan.

In the most tightly contested match of the first year’s competition, Kazakhstan claimed the bronze position with a 5-4 win over Korea. The game went to a shootout, where Anastassiya Orazbayeva was the only player to score. She beat Korean netminder Yeonju Kim in the sixth round, while Arina Chshyokolova was perfect for the Kazakhs.

The rematch between those two sides will serve as this year’s tournament finale in Oskemen.

The last time the Kazakh women played an international tournament on home ice, they were victorious in the second round of Olympic Qualification in their capital city of Astana in 2016.

Japan’s women’s team sits seventh among currently participating nations in the IIHF World Ranking, a score that reflects the long-term quality of a national team program by awarding points based on results over the last four years. China ranks 12^th in the rankings, while Korea is 18^th and Kazakhstan sits 22^nd.

Japan will be Asia’s lone entrant in the women’s tournament at the 2026 Winter Olympic Games in Milan and is a regular participant in the top division of the IIHF Women’s World Championship, which will be contested next in November of 2026. China also competed at that level in 2024 before returning to Division 1A in 2025, while Korea and Kazakhstan competed in Division 1B.

In preparation for this year's tournament, Kazakhstan and China faced off in a friendly pre-tournament matchup on 30 October.

The IIHF Asia Championships were developed as a means of encouraging the growth ice hockey in the region, providing opportunities for national teams to face off against each other and promoting the sport for both players and fans.

The men’s edition of the tournament features the same four nations as the women. Kazakhstan took gold in the first installment while serving as hosts in Almaty in November of 2024. The 2026 event will be held in Beijing, China from 20-23 November 2025.