DEL Preview

There will most probably be three teams this year, who can be regarded as the top contenders for the Championship although the league is very strong and I see up to 9 teams with chances to win it.

Let’s start with the top teams from Berlin, Cologne and Mannheim.

Cologne will go into the season with only one major change on the roster. Felix Schütz will seek his chance in the KHL this year in Wladiwostok. But the Sharks don’t have to worry too much. Although losing him as one of the top scorers on the team hurts, they were able to get a well-known face back, who isn’t a stranger to high scoring himself. Marcel Müller returned from Sweden’s Modo Örnsköldsvik. The rest of the team will be familiar faces.

The champions from Berlin had to suffer a tough (but hopefully only temporary) loss during the off-season with national blue-liner Constantin Braun, who left the team for treatment of depressions. Not only the Eisbären hope that he will be back soon. For the rest Berlin kept changes to a minimum as it has been an Eisbären tradition over the last decade. Mark Katic left to try his luck in the KHL for the expansion team Medveszak Zagreb, but they acquired Casey Borer from Nuremberg, who was one of the best DEL defenders last season. In the offense they lost a few role players like Tyson Mulock and Corey Locke, but Berlin also has a history of filling up holes with talented youngsters. Vincent Schlenker will be one of the guys to see more ice-time this year.

In Mannheim they changed a bit more than in Cologne and Berlin. National defender Christopher Fischer will try to fill the gap Doug Janik and Shawn Belle left at the Eagles’ blue line. But the most important improvements came on offense. After seeing Mike Glumac (also to Zagreb) and some role players leave, Adler Mannheim aquired a full line from the national team. Kai Hospelt, Martin Buchwieser and former NHL star Jochen Hecht will add some tremendous punch up front.

These three team will be on the same level and will most certainly provide a big battle this year for the top spot in the Play-Offs. But behind them there are a couple of teams that could easily get into that mix, if everything works out well.

The team with the best financial situation due to its sponsor is EHC Munich. They almost exchanged their whole roster. In the preseason they already raised some eye-brows with wins over Magnitogorsk and Omsk. However, bringing a team together from scratch needs some time for adjustments, so expect them to get out a bit slower before getting into Play-Off shape. The team will obviuously bring an interesting mixture to the ice. With Jon di Salvatore and Darren Haydar they got two excellent scorers from the AHL. Add the second German national player returning from Sweden, Alexander Barta, and you have a talented offense. But their talented guys will be protected as they also acquired two of the most feared agitators in the league in Yannic Seidenberg and Sean O’Connor.

The Hamburg Freezers are currently having some trouble in the European Trophy. Out of the four games so far, they couldn’t win one. The problem is that they lost a full line in Brandon “Turbo” Reid, who signed with no one else than CSKA Moscow in the KHL, Rob Collins and Colin Murphy.  There will be more pressure this year on the young German line of Wolf, Festerling and Flaake. Nevertheless, if this line can keep up the play from the last two years, the Freezers might have a chance to be a contender again.

The other team from the European Trophy is much more successful there. Ingolstadt has already beaten Zurich and Zug, before falling to Frölunda and Färjestad. Ingolstadt’s toughest challenge this year will be between the pipes. Ian Gordon ended his career and will be replaced by youngster Timo Pielmeier (acquired from 2^nd tier Landshut Cannibals) and Markus Janka. In their defense they added a German element this year in Benedikt Schopper and Patrik Köppchen. The offense will remain more or less the same and indeed that was the area that needed least improvement as they have one of the most creative offenses in the league, in example in Derek Hahn, Thomas Greilinger and Patrick Hager. Tough guy O’Connor was replaced by Travis Turnbull from the DEG.

The two big surprises from last year will only be in the mix again if they can deal with some significant tasks. Krefeld’s Penguins and Wolfsburg had to suffer few, but important losses. In Krefeld goalie Scott Langkow left along with top defenders Dusan Milo and Richard Pavlikovsky. If you also take into consideration that Krefeld’s top defender last season was Christian Ehrhoff, who only played half of the games due to the NHL lockout, it appears that defense will be a key point for the Penguins this year. The only replacement they got so far is Nick St Pierre from Czech champions HC Plzen.

Wolfsburg lost three national players in total, among them their captain Kai Hospelt. To replace him and the defenders Schopper and Fischer will be a tough job.

Straubing, Augsburg, Düsseldorf and Iserlohn will most probably fight for the last Pre-Play-Off spots.

Two teams will be the big question marks in this season: Nuremberg and Schwenningen.

The Ice Tigers were one of the favorites last year, but disappointed many. This year they didn’t change too much, but lost a few important guys like Ryan Bayda and Dusan Frosch. However, there is still lots of talent in the team. Guys like Jason Jaspers, Patrick Reimer and Steven Reinprecht have seen everything in hockey and are known scorers. If they can find the game, they didn’t find last season, they will be in the Play-Offs for sure.

Schwenningen obviously had to change a lot. The vice champion of the 2^nd Bundesliga came into the DEL by buying Hannover’s license. That’s why they had a couple of guys coming in from Hannover like Morten Green, Sascha Goc and goalie Dimitri Pätzold. They acquired some interesting players like Tyler Beechey and Ryan Ramsay or on defense Elias Granath (from Djurgarden), but it is way too early to say where this team is heading. Especially since the enthusiasm of the fans can also be a factor in Schwenningen in home games.

Tweets by @eurohockey