We continue our look back to the Champions Hockey League’s inaugural season of 2014/15. That year, Italian-based HC Bolzano qualified as champions of Austria’s multi-national league, then called EBEL. After losing their first two games – badly – they made their home debut on 5 September 2014.
The visitors were TPS Turku, who had shellacked the Foxes 9-0 in Finland a week earlier, and at first it looked like it might be a similar story in northern Italy. Turku scored twice in the first five minutes but Bolzano stormed back to tie the score on two Anton Bernard goals before the first intermission. Still 2-2 midway through the third period, Marco Insam scored the game-winner with 6:15 to go and an empty-netter sealed it.
The Foxes were now playing like a league champion, but why the poor start? To start with, there had been significant roster turnover and a new coach, with Mario Simioni taking the helm.
“Before the first game we'd had only 10 on-ice practices as a team. The players didn't even know each other properly,” explained team captain Alexander Egger. “We knew that we weren't yet where we should be. At home, it also became easier to play. Our fans are like a wall behind us.”
Notice that the scoring is opened by 17-year-old Mikko Rantanen, who is now an NHL regular with the Colorado Avalanche. Also in the TPS lineup is Ryan Lasch, now the CHL’s all-time points leader who has since won three European titles with the Frölunda Indians. In addition to Egger, the Bolzano lineup that season included Slovenian international Žiga Pance.
Bolzano went on to finish respectably with three wins and three losses for nine points – good for third place in Group F. Better things were to come, however, as the team reached the CHL Round of 16 in 2018/19, becoming the first Italian-based club to advance that far. As for TPS, they finished second in the group with 12 points and then went out to Finnish rivals Lukko Rauma in the Round of 16. The following year, it was Lukko again ending their journey in the Quarter-Finals, which marks their deepest CHL run to date.