Karel Gut

Karel Gut (16 September 1927 – 6 January 2014) was a Czech ice hockey player and coach, who later worked in sports management. He was born in Prague and later played in the Czechoslovak Extraliga. While Gut played soccer in his youth, he was better known as an, "offensive-minded hockey defenseman". and six World Cup appearances.

Coaching career In 1964 he retired from his playing career in ice hockey and became an ice hockey coach.

In the late 1970s, after having observed Roger Neilson of the Toronto Maple Leafs using ringette rings and concepts during a practice in Canada, Gut went back to Czechoslovakia and introduced and modified these ideas and applied them to the training system for the national men's team's practices, which was then also applied as a training aid for Czechoslovakia's university ice hockey teams.

Management career When Czechoslovakia was divided, Gut became chairman of the Czech Ice Hockey Association. The team went on to take the gold medal at the 1998 Winter Olympics in Japan and won four VM-Gold in 1996, 1999, 2000 and 2001.