Kaufbeuren

The Allgäu-Derby against ECDC Memmingen Indians still draws the crowds who remember when Kaufbeuren mattered at the top of German hockey, and games against EV Füssen and ESC Kempten carry the same regional weight, decided as much on pride as on points.

That top level lasted four seasons. Kaufbeuren joined the Deutsche Eishockey Liga in 1994 as a founding member, playing briefly under the name Kaufbeurer Adler, and left the league in 1998 without a championship. The club's stronger years came earlier, in the old Bundesliga and its second tier, where four 2. Bundesliga titles arrived across two decades, in 1961, 1969, 1974 and 1980, alongside a runner-up finish in the top flight in 1966 and third place in both 1964 and 1965.

Those seasons were built on a defensive line supporters still call the Kaufbeurer Stadtmauer, the Kaufbeuren city wall, with Bohuslav Šťastný among the men who manned it. Up front, Dieter Hegen was rated the best German left winger of his century and took the Bundesliga scoring title in 1980/81 with 54 goals, a decade after Manfred Hubner became the first Kaufbeuren player to top the league's scoring charts. Stefan Ustorf captained the club long enough that his number 17 was retired.

The team plays as ESVK, though older fans still use Buron Joker, a nod to the club mascot, and takes the ice in red and yellow. Since the DEL years ended, the honours have come from lower down: the Regionalliga Süd title in 2000 and the Oberliga Süd championship in 2009, with a runner-up finish there in 2002. Kaufbeuren has never won the DEB-Pokal. The club now competes to re-establish itself in that tier, still chasing the standard set by the sides that once held their own against the country's best.