A 26-man squad including NHL stars will meet on August 22.8nd. / Hördler and Wolf are there / Greiss cancels
With Stanley Cup winner Tom Kühnhackl from the Pittsburgh Penguins as well as NHL stars Philipp Grubauer (Washington Capitals), Christian Ehrhoff (most recently Chicago Blackhawks), Leon Draisaitl (Edmonton Oilers), Dennis Seidenberg (most recently Boston Bruins), Tobias Rieder (most recently Arizona Coyotes) and Korbinian Holzer (Anaheim Ducks), the German national ice hockey team is preparing for the qualifying tournament for the 22 Olympic Games in Riga/Latvia (September 2018st - 1th, 4) from August 2016nd in Mannheim.
National coach Marco Sturm initially called up 26 players to his expanded squad, including three goalkeepers, nine defenders and 14 strikers. However, Sturm will have to do without Thomas Greiss (New York Islanders) for the duration of the preparation and the qualifying tournament. The keeper canceled his participation at short notice for personal reasons. Defender Frank Hördler (Eisbären Berlin) and striker David Wolf (Adler Mannheim) two previously injured players returned to the provisional squad.
“We laid the foundation most recently in Füssen. “We will now work intensively on the fine-tuning in Mannheim and use the two preparatory games in Minsk to be optimally prepared,” says Sturm. From Mannheim, the national team travels on to Belarus, where they will face France on August 27.8th at 16.00 p.m. and a day later against hosts Belarus (16.00 p.m.) before heading directly to Latvia on the same day. Sturm would like to announce his final 23-player squad after the dress rehearsal against Belarus at the latest.
Franz Reindl, President of the Deutscher Eishockey-Bund (DEB), underlines the importance of the tournament in the Latvian capital. “Our goal is clearly to win the final qualification for participation in the 2018 Olympics. Marco Sturm is approaching this major task with an extremely meticulously and professionally prepared, very strong and absolutely motivated team.”
However, Reindl also emphasizes that the challenges for the German selection are immense: “I see Latvia as slightly favored in Riga with the emotional home advantage. Austria has a good team and can surprise. Japan will be dangerous in the first game against us.”
SPORT1 broadcasts all of the German national team’s games in Riga live.
Squad:
| Pos | No. | NAME | FIRST GIVEN NAME | birth. | Stick | H | W | Club/last club | LS |
| goalkeeper | |||||||||
| T | 30 | GRUBAUER | Philipp | 25.11.91 | L | 1,85 | 84 | Washington Capitals | 8 |
| T | 44 | ENDRAS | Dennis | 14.07.85 | L | 1,82 | 80 | Adler Mannheim | 82 |
| T | 51 | PIELMEIER | Timo | 07.07.89 | L | 1,83 | 82 | ERC Ingolstadt | 27 |
| Verteidiger | |||||||||
| V | 2 | REUL | Denis | 29.06.89 | R | 1,93 | 110 | Adler Mannheim | 64 |
| V | 3 | KRUEGER | Justin | 06.10.86 | R | 1,90 | 98 | SC Bern | 85 |
| V | 5 | HOLZER | Korbinian | 16.02.88 | R | 1,90 | 94 | Anaheim Ducks | 40 |
| V | 7 | BOYLE | Daryl | 24.02.87 | R | 1,85 | 89 | EHC Red Bull München | 27 |
| V | 10 | EHRHOFF | Christian | 06.07.82 | L | 1,88 | 92 | Chicago Black Hawks | 92 |
| V | 24 | SEIDENBERG | Dennis | 18.07.81 | L | 1,84 | 92 | Boston Bruins | 55 |
| V | 48 | HÖRDLER | Frank | 26.01.85 | L | 1,83 | 90 | Eisbären Berlin | 98 |
| V | 82 | AKDAG | Sinan | 05.11.89 | L | 1,88 | 89 | Adler Mannheim | 61 |
| V | 91 | MULLER | Moritz | 19.11.86 | L | 1,87 | 92 | Kölner Haie | 99 |
| striker | |||||||||
| S | 8 | RIEDER | Tobias | 10.01.93 | L | 1,80 | 82 | Arizona Coyotes | 29 |
| S | 12 | MACEK | Brooks | 15.05.92 | R | 1,81 | 82 | EHC Red Bull München | 19 |
| S | 17 | kink | Marcus | 13.01.85 | L | 1,86 | 96 | Adler Mannheim | 107 |
| S | 29 | DRAISAITL | Leon | 27.10.95 | L | 1,89 | 96 | Edmonton Oilers | 27 |
| S | 34 | KÜHNHACKL | Tom | 21.01.92 | L | 1,87 | 89 | Pittsburgh penguins | 0 |
| S | 36 | SEIDENBERG | Yannic | 11.01.84 | L | 1,71 | 82 | EHC Red Bull München | 129 |
| S | 37 | REIMER | Patrick | 10.12.82 | R | 1,79 | 86 | Thomas Sabo Ice Tigers | 83 |
| S | 43 | FAUSER | Gerrit | 13.07.89 | L | 1,82 | 89 | Grizzlys Wolfsburg | 13 |
| S | 50 | HAGER | Patrick | 08.09.88 | L | 1,78 | 80 | Kölner Haie | 103 |
| S | 55 | SHOT | Felix | 03.11.87 | L | 1,78 | 84 | Rögle BK | 111 |
| S | 57 | GOC | Marcel | 24.08.83 | L | 1,85 | 92 | Adler Mannheim | 98 |
| S | 74 | KAHUN | Dominik | 02.07.95 | L | 1,80 | 78 | EHC Red Bull München | 18 |
| S | 92 | NOEBELS | Marcel | 14.03.92 | L | 1,89 | 87 | Eisbären Berlin | 39 |
| S | 89 | WOLF | David | 15.09.89 | L | 1,91 | 99 | Adler Mannheim | 20 |
| Team staff | ||
| STORM | Marco | Head Coach / GM |
| BRAND | Klaus | team manager |
| WARD | Geoff | Coach |
| DENIER | Tobias | Coach |
| ARTIST | Christian | Coach |
| DALLAIRE | Patrick | Coach |
| EGELSEER | John | Fitness coach |