Eisbaren Berlin

Dynamo, and what came after it

The club that fills a 14,200-seat arena by the Spree began in 1954 as the ice hockey section of SC Dynamo Berlin, part of the SV Dynamo sports association that served the Stasi, the Volkspolizei and the customs service. Under that badge it won fifteen East German championships, the last of them in 1988, with an institutional backing that made it the team much of the rest of the GDR wanted to see beaten.

Reunification stripped that arrangement out. The hockey department went independent in 1990 as EHC Dynamo Berlin, and in 1992 took the name EHC Eisbären Berlin along with the polar bear crest that is still on the shirt. Two years later the club was a founding member of the Deutsche Eishockey Liga when the DEL replaced the old Bundesliga in 1994.

For most of that period home was the Kunsteisstadion in the Sportforum Hohenschönhausen — 4,695 capacity, 1,600 seats and 3,095 on terraces, with a corrugated iron roof that a journalist in the early 1990s turned into an insult: the Wellblechpalast, the corrugated-iron palace. The name stuck, the insult did not, and it was formally adopted as the building's name on 7 October 2001.

Anschutz money and the move across the river

The Anschutz Entertainment Group bought in during 1999, which is the dividing line in the club's modern record. The first DEL title arrived in 2004–05, the second the following year, and the run continued with championships in 2008 and 2009.

In 2008–09 the team left Hohenschönhausen for the new arena at Ostbahnhof, now the Uber Arena, tripling its capacity at a stroke. Nine of the club's twelve DEL titles have come since the move: 2009, 2011, 2012, 2013, 2021, 2022, 2024, 2025 and 2026. The Wellblechpalast was never given up — it remains the training base and the home of the Eisbären Juniors and other Berlin amateur sides, and the senior team still plays there when the schedule calls for it.

The three-peat, and how it was actually won

The 2025–26 championship was not the work of a dominant regular season. Berlin finished sixth over 52 games with 23 wins, six overtime wins, four overtime losses and 19 defeats for 85 points, scoring 171 and conceding 157. Liam Kirk carried the scoring with 32 goals and 23 assists in all 52 games.

The playoffs were a different team. Straubing Tigers went 4–2 in the quarter-finals, Kölner Haie 4–2 in the semi-finals, and Adler Mannheim were beaten 4–1 in the final series. The clincher, on 4 May 2026, finished 4–1: Ty Ronning scored at 19:01 and again at 44:00, Kirk made it three shortly after the second period began, Mannheim pulled one back through Michaelis late, and Eric Mik finished it into the empty net. Goaltender Jonas Stettmer was named playoff MVP.

That was the twelfth DEL title, more than any other club, and the third in succession — 2024, 2025, 2026. It also carried Berlin into the Champions Hockey League for 2026/27.

A new bench boss and two holes in goal

Serge Aubin, who had won five championships in six seasons, left for SC Bern despite a contract running to 2028. His replacement is Éric Dubois, 56, a Canadian former defenceman who played in Europe with Oberhausen and Schwenningen between 1997 and 2002, moved into coaching in 2003 and spent last season as Mark French's assistant at league rival ERC Ingolstadt. He has signed for one year and has been blunt about his brief: he does not want to change much.

The squad is largely the one that won in May, which is how sporting director Stephane Richer wanted it, but both goaltenders left. Jake Hildebrand went to Mannheim and Stettmer, fresh from his MVP award, to Ingolstadt. Jack LaFontaine and Jonas Neffin came in to replace them.

Outside the dressing room the assessment is cooler than the trophy count suggests. In a pre-season poll of rival coaches, only one of fourteen named Berlin as the outright favourite; Mannheim and Cologne were rated more highly. A fourth consecutive title would be a DEL record.

Where the season stands

Berlin have been playing competitively since late summer in the Champions Hockey League, using the Wellblechpalast for European home games. A 2–1 win over Danish champions Herning Blue Fox, with goals from Leo Pföderl at 29:29 on the power play and Eric Hördler at 32:53, completed a six-point weekend in front of 3,315 and left the club on six points from four league-phase games, 14th in the table.

The domestic season opened at home to Straubing on 17 September 2026, a 4–2 win in front of 13,422 after the 2026 championship banner was raised. Manuel Wiederer scored from the blue line in the 17th minute, Kirk added a second early in the middle period, Ronning tapped in a third, and Mik sealed it into the empty net at 58:52 after Adrian Klein and Stefan Loibl had brought Straubing back to 3–2. The shot count told a different story from the scoreline: 30 for the visitors, 21 for Berlin, with LaFontaine making the save that held the game together during a penalty-heavy stretch in the 28th minute. Captain Kai Wissmann sat the game out, serving a suspension carried over from last season.

Three days later, on 20 September, a 2–0 lead was thrown away in a 4–3 defeat to Mannheim. Next up are Kölner Haie away on 25 September and Iserlohn Roosters at home on 27 September, a 14:00 Sunday start.