EC KAC

Klagenfurt Athletic Sports Club or EC KAC (German: Klagenfurter Athletiksport Club) is a professional ice hockey team in the ICE Hockey League. The team plays their home games in Klagenfurt, Carinthia, Austria at Stadthalle Klagenfurt. EC KAC has won the most Austrian ice hockey Championships, a total of 32 times including 11 consecutive titles from 1964 to 1974, and four consecutive from 1985 to 1988. Most recently they won it in 2021.

Klagenfurt AC
CityKlagenfurt, Carinthia, Austria
LeagueICE Hockey League
Founded1909 (1909)
Home arenaStadthalle Klagenfurt
(Capacity: 5,500)
Colors   
Owner(s)EC-KAC Betriebs GmbH
General managerOliver Pilloni
Head coachKirk Furey[1]
CaptainThomas Koch
WebsiteEC KAC
Franchise history
1909–EC KAC
Championships
Austrian Champions32 (1934, 1935, 1952, 1955, 1960, 1964, 1965, 1966, 1967, 1968, 1969, 1970, 1971, 1972, 1973, 1974, 1976, 1977, 1979, 1980, 1985, 1986, 1987, 1988, 1991, 2000, 2001, 2004, 2009, 2013, 2019, 2021)

History

The Klagenfurt Athletic Sports Club was founded on 18 September 1909 as an association.[2] In 1919 the first attempts to establish an ice hockey team were trialled with an initial two-year apprenticeship from 1923 to 1925, before hockey was established as a full-fledged association in 1926.[3]

In 1926, EC KAC joined the Austrian Ice Hockey Federation. At that time, there were no uniforms and the hockey players wore gym shorts, soccer socks, football jerseys, and skates known as Friesen, which used shoes made of wood with a metal bar as a runner, which were laced with leather straps on the feet. The puck was initially made from two soles of women's shoes nailed together. Much depended more on the ingenuity and dedication of the players and the preparation of the ice surface at the Kreuzberglteich.

In the 1933–34 season, EC KAC won its first league title and thus stopped the almost uninterrupted dominance of the Vienna Ice Skating Association. It marked the first time the title had not been awarded to a team from Vienna. The Second World War interrupted play abruptly and post-war it took a long time to get the league back functioning properly. However, many stars from the KAC's first league title success could again be counted to be the nucleus and further accelerated the rise of EC KAC well into the 1950s.

Between 1952 and 1960, KAC managed three further League titles, in a period in which Innsbruck EV were prominent in the Austrian Championship. With games still played outdoors and susceptible to inclement weather, on 22 November 1959, the Stadthalle Klagenfurt complex opened, which after several modifications is still in use today as the home rink of EC KAC.

At the turn of the 1960s, with the influx of influential players such as Dieter Kalt Snr and Sepp Puschnig, KAC sowed the seeds in dominating the Austrian championship from 1964 to 1980, in which the title went fifteen times to Klagenfurt. The team's only serious challenger in that time was ATSE Graz, which broke through with titles in 1975 and 1978.

During this time, EC KAC also partook in several European Cups. They first played in the 1965–66 season, and in the following 1966–67 season, the team reached the semi-finals and had to compete, as in the following season, against ZLK Brno. In 1969–70, EC KAC reached the final against HC CSKA Moscow, where they lost. Overall, EC KAC participated in the tournament nineteen times; only two fewer than the record held by CSKA Moscow.

Players

Current roster

Updated 4 February 2023.[4]

No. Nat Player Pos S/G Age Acquired Birthplace
46 Austria Johannes Bischofberger C/LW L 29 2016 Dornbirn, Austria
13 Latvia Rihards Bukarts RW R 27 2022 Jurmala, Latvia
32 Denmark Sebastian Dahm G L 36 2020 København, Denmark
90 Canada Matt Fraser (A) LW L 33 2020 Red Deer, Alberta, Canada
17 Austria Manuel Ganahl (A) W L 33 2019 Bludenz, Austria
68 Slovenia Luca Gomboc LW L 19 2022 Kranj, Slovenia
11 Austria Lukas Haudum C L 26 2019 Linz, Austria
97 Austria Fabian Hochegger C R 22 2021 Klagenfurt, Austria
27 Austria Thomas Hundertpfund F L 33 2014 Klagenfurt, Austria
41 Denmark Jesper Jensen Aabo D L 32 2022 Rødovre, Denmark
18 Austria Thomas Koch (C) C L 40 2011 Klagenfurt, Austria
80 Austria Nikolaus Kraus F L 26 2015 Wien, Austria
6 Canada Lucas Lessio LW L 30 2022 Maple, Ontario, Canada
12 Austria David Maier D R 23 2020 St. Veit an der Glan, Austria
98 Austria Daniel Obersteiner F L 25 2015 St. Veit an der Glan, Austria
8 Canada Nick Petersen RW R 34 2018 Wakefield, Quebec, Canada
87 Austria Tobias Piuk F L 19 2022 Klagenfurt, Austria
14 Canada Paul Postma D R 34 2020 Red Deer, Alberta, Canada
4 Austria Kele Steffler D L 25 2018 Durango, Colorado, United States
24 Austria Steven Strong D L 30 2015 Villach, Austria
42 Slovenia Rok Ticar C L 34 2020 Jesenice, Slovenia
72 Austria Neal Unterluggauer D R 21 2022 Donaueschingen, Austria
92 Austria Clemens Unterweger D L 31 2018 Lienz, Austria
1 Slovenia Val Usnik G L 22 2021 Ljubljana, Slovenia
10 Austria Thomas Vallant D R 27 2020 Wolfsberg, Austria
81 Austria Finn van Ee F L 20 2020 Zell am See, Austria
47 Austria Marcel Witting RW L 28 2018 Hall in Tirol, Austria
48 Austria Samuel Witting F L 25 2020 Hall in Tirol, Austria
29 United States Mike Zalewski C L 31 2022 New Hartford, New York, United States

References
  1. "Petri Matikainen wird Head Coach | EC-KAC – Klagenfurt Eishockey". kac.at (in German). Retrieved 4 May 2018.
  2. St. Johann Metz, Hane Witek and Thomas Zeloth, ed. (2008). Nach Spielzeit. National Archives. p. 7.
  3. 75 Years of KAC, 1909-1984. EC KAC. 1984. p. 33.
  4. "EC KAC – Team -Roster". EC KAC. 4 February 2023. Retrieved 4 February 2023.
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