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**Anton Gramscescu** · 25-10-2010, 02:24

Minority interest non-NHL ice hockey thread

Oh good, this is back.

Zsombi is a fantastic club name. I assume the club badge is George Romero-themed?

**ad hoc** · 25-10-2010, 02:35

Minority interest non-NHL ice hockey thread

Zsombi is the kid's name. (Diminutive of Zsombor).

It cracked me up the first time I encountered it too. It now just feels normal.

**Anton Gramscescu** · 25-10-2010, 09:37

Minority interest non-NHL ice hockey thread

Oops. of course. I need to stop posting when sleep-deprived.

So, how does this competition work, anyway? What happens to the winner of the group in Italy?

**ursus arctos** · 25-10-2010, 10:12

Minority interest non-NHL ice hockey thread

I need to stop posting when sleep-deprived.

Don't go, Gramsci. We would all miss you . . .

Fantastic result for HSC (I also love the spelling of Hochei). Ukraine aren't a patch on the Kazakhs at international level, so I think they have a chance. Asiago (the Italian champions) are certainly nothing special.

**ad hoc** · 25-10-2010, 22:43

Minority interest non-NHL ice hockey thread

The competition appears to be a fairly complex one for champions of lesser leagues in Europe. I was going to compare it to the UEFA Cup but a better analogy would be the Johnstone's Paint Trophy.

Anyway, for what it's worth there was a preliminary group in September featuring the champions of Lithuania, Israel, Spain and Turkey (except the airline the Lithuanians were coming on went bust so they didn't make it. Jaca of Spain qualified.

Then last week there were two further groups:
Grp B: Tilburg Trappers (NED), Kohtla-J�rve Viru Sputnik (EST), Cracovia (POL), and Jaca (ESP) who had won the prelim
and
Grp C: HDK Maribor (SLO), Dab Dunaujvaros (HUN), HSC (RO), Sary-Arka Karaganda (KAZ).

Now in November there will be two new groups:
Grp D: Rouen Dragons (FRA), Coventry Blaze (GBR), Liepajas Metalurgs (LAT), and Cracovia who won Group B.

Grp E: HC Asiago (ITA), S�nderjyskE Vojens (DEN), Sokil Kyiv (UKR), and HSC as Group C winners

Finally there is a final group in January:
Yunost Minsk (BLR), Red Bull Salzburg (AUT), Winner Group D, Winner Group E.

And that will decide the winners of the tournament. It seems to make more sense than the UEFA Cup type thing as there is actually some equality of matches, while the big leagues all play in the Champions League

**Anton Gramscescu** · 26-10-2010, 04:09

Minority interest non-NHL ice hockey thread

Wow. That;s an insane seeding system that allows Belarus and Austria to just waltz in at the end like that. Are they really that much better than everyone else?

**ad hoc** · 26-10-2010, 04:28

Minority interest non-NHL ice hockey thread

Probably. I know the Austrian league is much stronger than the Hungarian/Romanian league, for example, as Hungary's best team (who are absolutely miles ahead of all the others in the country) play in it, and struggle.

You're right though, it is a mental seeding system. Don't tell FIFA or UEFA about it or they'll start considering it for World Cup qualification. Didn't the grand slams in tennis used to have a system whereby the final was between the player who won through the standard tournament and last year's winner who just had to show up for one match?

**Unbelievable Jeff** · 26-10-2010, 04:47

Minority interest non-NHL ice hockey thread

The Coventry Blaze were my first exposure to hockey of any sort. One of my former workmates and his wife are season ticket holders, and we'd probably go as a group from work four or five times a year.

Coventry have won the EIHL four years out of six, but according to said friend, are distinctly average this year; they're currently fifth of ten. They have never made it past the group stage they have been drawn in.

**Reed John** · 26-10-2010, 05:24

Minority interest non-NHL ice hockey thread

ad hoc wrote:

Zsombi is the kid's name. (Diminutive of Zsombor).

It cracked me up the first time I encountered it too. It now just feels normal.

Nevertheless, if the club doesn't play "Zombie Nation" over the PA when he scores, their in-game sound people need to be fired.

We used to have a few people on here who were interested in some of the alpine hockey leagues, but I forget who they were or if they're still around.

**Janik** · 26-10-2010, 09:01

Minority interest non-NHL ice hockey thread

ad hoc wrote:

It seems to make more sense than the UEFA Cup type thing as there is actually some equality of matches, while the big leagues all play in the Champions League

Except the Champions League part doesn't exist.

**ursus arctos** · 26-10-2010, 09:19

Minority interest non-NHL ice hockey thread

There is that.

The stalwarts of the Euro hockey crowd were myself, Moitie/Moonlight Shadow and Ball Comrade, with guest appearances by PPV and contributions from just about everyone who has shown up on this thread.

What ad hoc said about the Austrian League. Like the Adriatic Basketball League, it is an interesting experiment in the type of multi-national league that we may one day see in football. The Belarussian league probably isn't as strong. Of the other Continental Cup participants, based on the performance of national teams one would expect the Kazakhs and Latvians to be the strongest, but it may well be the case that their best players play away from home (in the NHL, KHL, Germany, Czech Rep, etc). Many of the best Kazakhs (including Yevgeni Nabokov) actually play for Russia internationally.

**ad hoc** · 29-12-2010, 16:58

Minority interest non-NHL ice hockey thread

Resurrecting this old thread as I meant to do a while back. HSC got beaten in all their 3 games in the next round of the Continental Cup, but none of them were bad defeats and in general they did themselves proud. I think Asiago of Italy won it.

Now we are fully in the playoff season in the MOL Liga (that's the Hungarian/Romanian combined league). I hadn't realised until they got under way how absolutely insane the playoffs are this year - with 9 teams in the regular season, actually ALL of them qualify for the postseason - 8 and 9 played off for the right to face 1 and from there on it's a straight knock out. HSC will face Vasas (from Budapest) in the semi final while DAB (Dunaujvaros) face Miskolc.

When all that is done there will also be some derisory Romanian league in which HSC will undoubtedly face Brasov (a newish team) in the final. Steaua are looking very sick and may well fold soon, which would be a shame (they're not related to the football team, at least not any more, and their disappearance would really make ice hockey more or less purely a preserve of the Hungarian minority in Romania)

On Eurosport 2 today I caught a little bit of Canada facing Davos or someone. What's that all about?

**ursus arctos** · 29-12-2010, 17:03

Minority interest non-NHL ice hockey thread

That's the Spengler Cup (discussed briefly on the "FAO Moonlight Shadow" thread).

It's essentially a HC Davos Invitational, designed to make money for a club that has lots and give the locals something to do between the holidays other than ogle the super rich (they themselves being only rich).

"Canada" are a Mark Messier coached team that is primarily composed of pros playing in European leagues. Spartak Moscow are playing Dominic Hasek in goal, which is somewhat surreal. The other teams are Servette (thus Moonlight's interest), SKA of St. Petersburg and Sparta Praha.

**ad hoc** · 28-03-2011, 13:14

Minority interest non-NHL ice hockey thread

HSC did indeed win the MOL Liga, and the Romanian Cup, and are now two periods from winning the Romanian League for the 5th consecutive year. Anyone who's bored and got nothing better to do with their time can watch those last two periods on sopcast here http://spn2.ucoz.com/surse/sop/digi00.htm

HSC are 3-0 up after the first, but the series is at 3-2 rather than the imagined sweep. I've been to two of the games, and watched two others on TV and can see no possible way that Brasov won 2 games, but somehow they managed it.

Zsombi, my friends' son mentioned above, is going to Sweden on Wednesday to try out for a top flight team there, which will be a real step up for him. I reckon he'll be fine though. He's really come on this season.

**ad hoc** · 28-03-2011, 16:47

Minority interest non-NHL ice hockey thread

6-0. Penta-champions or whatever we would cal it in English.

**jason voorhees** · 15-04-2011, 16:37

Minority interest non-NHL ice hockey thread

The Great Swiss Trophy Breaking Scandal hath reached North America.

**ad hoc** · 19-05-2011, 14:59

Minority interest non-NHL ice hockey thread

Small update to this thread - my neighbour Zsombi went to Sweden after the season ended, and had a trial with a first division team there, who have now signed him on a contract. This is a huge leap as you can imagine, and it shows how good he is.

In the meantime I have got some insights into the working of professional sport through helping his parents translate/understand all the agents' agreements

**ursus arctos** · 19-05-2011, 15:24

Minority interest non-NHL ice hockey thread

That's fabulous (and potentially a huge break for Romanian hockey).

Do you recall which team signed him?

**ursus arctos** · 19-05-2011, 16:06

Minority interest non-NHL ice hockey thread

Jaromir Jagr to "do a Mario Lemieux" with HC Kladno."

Though it doesn't look like he will play for them, and Mario wishes he had a shot at Gazprom sponsorship.

**ad hoc** · 19-05-2011, 17:19

Minority interest non-NHL ice hockey thread

Mora (or Mora IK as I believe the full name is)

**Anton Gramscescu** · 07-09-2011, 13:32

Minority interest non-NHL ice hockey thread

Blimey.

RIP Lokomotiv Yaroslavl

**Amor de Cosmos** · 07-09-2011, 14:49

Minority interest non-NHL ice hockey thread

Dreadful.

**Reed John** · 07-09-2011, 16:45

Minority interest non-NHL ice hockey thread

Awful. And, as far as I can tell, very avoidable. Those planes are Soviet shit and they know it.

**Amor de Cosmos** · 07-09-2011, 16:47

Minority interest non-NHL ice hockey thread

Brad McCrimmon and Pavol Demitra two of those lost.

A tragedy for all the families concerned. As an ex-Canuck Demitra was the most familiar to me. TBH I thought he'd retired. A very silky, skilled player, his last years in the NHL were beset by injury and frequent leaves of absence to care for his wife who suffered from a chronic condition. Very sad.

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