Straubing Tigers: a beginner’s guide to DEL’s biggest surprise

If you follow the Deutsche Eishockey Liga, you may probably have noticed that this year was, to date, one of the most interesting ones in terms of upsets: for instance, the sudden and many defeats suffered by reigning champions Adler Mannheim, or the roaring comeback of Kölner Haie. But the most important feature of this season is surely the strong display of skills and improvement showed by Straubing Tigers, the smallest club in the whole league. Here is, then, a brief account of their history and of their current situation.

Based in Straubing, a town of 45.000 inhabitants situated in Lower Bavaria, the Tigers have a really long history: they were in fact founded as Bann Straubing in 1941, and went on to play in the 2. Bundesliga in 1975, after having won the Oberliga (the second and third tier of hockey in what was at the time West Germany). Because of poor performances and financial problems, the team ended up being relegated again to the Oberliga, but, after having filed for bankruptcy, had to restart directly from the Bayernliga, the regional Bavarian league (and fifth tier overall), in 1983. After just one season they went back to the Regionalliga, and then, after some ups and downs,they firmly remained in the Oberliga until the Nineties. At the time, the German league system changed a number of times, so it's hard to define their level by then: they were always situated between the second and third tier, anyways.

Since the year 2000 until the year 2006 the club (now known as "Die Tigers") remained in the 2.Bundesliga, and during the 2005/06 season won the title in that league, something that entitled them to buy a license and to begin playing in the DEL "on sporting grounds" (as you probably know, the DEL currently does not have a promotion and relegation system, though it had it in the past). Since then, they reached the playoffs only twice, in 2012 and 2013: during the former season they even managed to rech the semifinals, lost against eventual champions Eisbären Berlin.

The regular season has recently been quite displeasing for Straubing, who ended in the thirteen place last year. Having lost ten players after the 2014-15 campaign, the club had to resort to massive scouting, and the transfers were particularly successful: the ten losses were replaced with a massive Canadian contingent, including a couple of dual Canadian-German citizens. Many of those players have college hockey experience or many seasons in minor leagues like the AHL behind them, and even a couple of NHL games in their curriculums, others, like Connor James or Colton Jobke, were already previously playing in DEL teams. This combination of power and experience enabled the Tigers to begin as the top team in the table, with a current record of 6-0-4 in the regular season and an impressing 6-0-2 in the preseason games. Will they continue this way, despite a recent increase in their misfortunes and the arrival of the Haie near the top?  Well, let's see what will happen next...

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