Heilbronner Falken

Twice the club has gone under and twice come back playing. Heilbronner Falken filed for insolvency in 1990 and again in 2004. That pattern, more than any trophy, runs through the club's history.

The team grew out of the ice hockey department of the Rollschuh- und Eislaufverein Heilbronn, formed in 1980, before splitting off six years later as its own entity, Heilbronner Eishockey Club. The 2003 restructuring into Heilbronner Falken GmbH followed the second brush with insolvency and set the club on its current footing.

On the ice, Heilbronn built its identity in the lower divisions rather than at the top of German hockey. The club took the Süddeutsche Meisterschaft four times, in 1994, 1996, 1998 and 2005, before the 2007 Oberliga title finally carried it up into the second-tier league, where it stayed until relegation in 2023.

David Wolf came through the club on his way to the German national team, and Justin Kirsch led the scoring sheet in the 2020/21 season, a reminder that Heilbronn has produced players worth watching even without matching that with silverware at the higher level. The Bietigheim Steelers remain the closest rival, though the derby between the two has, at times, struggled to generate the edge that name suggests.

Since dropping back into the Oberliga Süd in 2023, the Falken have not found their way back to the second division they left.