Malmö Redhawks

Malmö Redhawks
2015–16 Malmö Redhawks season
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City	Malmö, Sweden
League	SHL
Founded	28 February 1972 (1972-02-28)
Home arena	Malmö Arena
Colors	Black, red and white
Owner(s)	Malmö Redhawks Holding AB
General manager	Patrik Sylvegård
Head coach	Björn Hellkvist
Captain	Henrik Hetta
Franchise history
1947–1972	Malmö FF Ishockey
1972–2001	Malmö IF
2001–2004	MIF Redhawks
2004–present	IF Malmö Redhawks
Le Mat Trophy	1992, 1994

Malmö Redhawks, also known simply as Malmö or by their former abbreviation MIF, is a Swedish professional ice hockey franchise based in Malmö. The team is currently playing in Sweden's premier hockey league, the SHL. They play their home games at Malmö Arena. The franchise has historical roots dating back to 1947 as the ice hockey section of the association football club Malmö FF. In 1972 the team broke lose from Malmö FF and started an independent franchise known as Malmö IF. The name was changed to MIF Redhawks in 2001, this lasted until 2004 when it was changed to Malmö Redhawks.

Malmö have played 19 seasons of ice hockey in Sweden's top tier, currently named the SHL, from 1987 to 2005. They made a brief comeback to the top tier in the 2006–07 season. They will once again play in the SHL for the 2015–16 season. The most successful era in the history of the franchise occurred during the 1990s when the team won two Swedish championships, in 1992 and 1994.

History

The team was founded on 28 February 1972 as Malmö Ishockeyförening (Malmö Ice Hockey Club, or MIF) when the ice hockey section of Malmö FF became an independent club. The early history of the club was unremarkable, spent in the lower divisions of Swedish hockey. Relegation to Division 2 in 1984 became the spark to a series of events including the departure of Nils Yngvesson who had been chairman of the club since its creation in 1972. The club only played one season in Division 2 before being promoted back to Division 1, where the club made what it refers to as "the biggest investment in Swedish sports history."

The club's campaign to reach the top league failed that season, but in the 1989–90 season, the club finished first in both their autumn Division 1 group, as well as the Allsvenskan in the spring, and then won the Allsvenskan final 3–0 in games against MoDo to secure promotion to Elitserien (today called the SHL) for the first time. They would remain in the top flight for 15 seasons, a period that would bring two name changes (to MIF Redhawks in 1996 and to IF Malmö Redhawks in 2003), as well as two Swedish Championship titles, in 1992 and 1994.

Decline by 2005

At the end of the 2004–05 season, the Redhawks played in the qualification series to stay in Elitserien, lost and were relegated. Thus, as of the 2005–06 season, they played in the HockeyAllsvenskan, the second division hockey league in Sweden; at the end of the season, the top 4 teams played the qualification series with the bottom two teams of Elitserien. Malmö won the qualification round and played in Elitserien during the 2006–07 season with limited success. Finishing the season as 12th (last) meant playing Kvalserien in order to avoid relegation for the second time in three years. On 1 April 2007, the Redhawks finished third in 2008-09 Kvalserien and was relegated to the Allsvenskan league.

Failed qualification efforts in 2007 and 2008

In 2007, Malmö Redhawks participated in a qualification series (Kvalserien) consisting of the top four teams of HockeyAllsvenskan and the bottom two teams from Elitserien, having finished 12th in the 2007–08 Elitserien season. Malmö were considered favourites alongside the second team from Elitserien, Skellefteå AIK, but failed to re-qualify for Elitserien, falling two points behind Södertälje SK. In 2008 the team once again managed to reach Kvalserien, and had a golden opportunity to advance to Elitserien, leading the series during a majority of rounds. The Redhawks, however, lost in overtime of the final round while their arch rivals, Rögle BK, claimed the Elitserien spot with a margin of two points by scoring twice in the last minute of play. The Redhawks only managed to get 2 points in the 2008 Kvalserien's last four rounds, despite having gotten 15 points after the first six games.

New arena and financial issues in 2009

During the 2008–09 season, Malmö Redhawks moved to the new Malmö Arena, a top-modern sports and entertainment venue. The club originally aimed to be back in Elitserien before the premiere.

On 29 January 2009, while still playing in HockeyAllsvenskan, the team released all its contracted players due to financial debt and to avoid bankruptcy. The players were made free to find and sign with new clubs. By then the Redhawks were ranked 10th in the league with only one month of games remaining to play, instead of the top three or seven required for Kvalserien and possible Elitserien qualification. The team finished 8th and thus missed the playoffs, although the team was just one point short from reaching the playoffs.

Failures to reach Kvalserien and started efforts

Malmö Redhawks finished fifth in HockeyAllsvenskan in the 2009–10 season and thus reached the playoffs, which was an improvement over last season. The Redhawks started the playoffs by knocking out Bofors IK in two straight games, and the Redhawks were now set to face Almtuna IS for a series that would decide which team would be HockeyAllsvenskan's fourth one in Kvalserien. The Redhawks beat Almtuna 2–1 at home in the first game, but lost the two following games (which the Redhawks played on away ice) and thus were eliminated from the playoffs. In the 2010–11 season, things went worse as the Redhawks failed to reach the playoffs, finishing 8th and four points short from a playoff spot.

On 28 January 2011, during the 2010–11 season, the Redhawks announced that they had agreed to a 3-year 70-million SEK ($10.6 million USD) deal with businessman Hugo Stenbeck. The goal with the 3-year-long deal is to get Malmö Redhawks back in Elitserien.

Malmö's efforts to reach Elitserien started immediately prior to the 2011–12 season. Several players from higher divisions, including Hannu Toivonen, Daniel Josefsson, J. D. Forrest, Jean-Luc Grand-Pierre and Linus Klasen, joined the club. When Linus Klasen joined the team on 17 May 2011, he was immediately appointed the team's captain. Linus Klasen's three-year contract with the club included an annual salary of 4 million SEK ($0.6 million USD), which made Klasen the best paid ice hockey player in Sweden at that time.

The season started well with a top 3 spot in the league after a couple of months, but after falling down to sixth place with 47 points, at that time ten points away from the third Kvalserien spot, the Redhawks' then head coach Leif Strömberg was fired on 10 December 2011. He was replaced by the team's then assistant coach Ulf Taavola. Patrik Sylvegård was acquired as the team's new assistant coach. After continued struggling throughout January, the Malmö Redhawks improved sharply in February, and managed to squeeze out a seventh-place finish in the league, which was enough for at least a playoff spot. In the Playoff round, Malmö finished second due to inferior goal difference than Rögle BK, and Malmö therefore missed the 2012 Kvalserien.

Reorganization, and failures to reach the playoffs

In early 2012, the club owner announced that the financial situation needed to be reviewed. As a result, the Redhawks filed for economic reconstruction on 11 April 2012. The filing was granted the following day. The club re-negotiated the most expensive player contracts in order to reduce the total salary cap from 30 million SEK down to 18 million.

On 17 May 2012 it was announced that the club and Hugo Stenbeck had agreed that Stenbeck would help the club buy out Linus Klasen and Hannu Toivonen due to their expensive contracts.

After the 2011–12 season, Patrik Sylvegård was appointed CEO and sports director, and Redhawks profile Mats Lusth was acquired as the new assistant coach. A Sports Committee was also created, which includes people with strong connection to Malmö Redhawks. Ulf Taavola continued as head coach like the previous season when he took over Leif Strömberg. Malmö Redhawks had to sign a lot of new players. The players who remained from last season were Pontus Sjögren, Emil Carnestad, Stefan Lassen, Alexander Ribbenstrand, Robin Alvarez, Lukas Eriksson, Magnus Häggström, Tomas Kollar and Roger Olsson.

Malmö Redhawks started the 2012–13 season bad, and after 17 games played, the team had only taken 21 points, which was far from even a playoff spot towards Kvalserien. Eventually, the team began a massive boost, which went through the month of November without a single loss after regulation time, and took a total of 24 out of 27 points that month. As a result of the great effort in November, the Malmö Redhawks were located in fifth place in the league by early December. In January, the team began a losing streak and lost 8 games in a row. The team finished in ninth place, which was the worst placing the team had since the large investments during the late 1980s. In Malmö, the season was over on March 2, when the regular season was finished.

Season-by-season record

This is a partial list of the last five seasons completed by the Redhawks. For the full season-by-season history, see List of Malmö Redhawks seasons

Note: GP = Games played, W = Wins, L = Losses, T = Ties, Pts = Points, GF = Goals for, GA = Goals against

Season	Regular Season									Post–Season									Ref.
	League	GP	W	L	T	Pts	GF	GA	Finish	Playoffs	GP	W	L	T	Pts	GF	GA	Finish
2010–11	HockeyAllsvenskan	52	21	18	13	80	153	144	8th	Did not qualify	—	—	—	—	—	—	—	—
2011–12	HockeyAllsvenskan	52	22	21	9	81	139	140	7th	Playoff round	6	4	2	0	13	19	13	2nd
2012–13	HockeyAllsvenskan	52	20	24	8	71	151	150	9th	Did not qualify	—	—	—	—	—	—	—	—
2013–14	HockeyAllsvenskan	52	30	12	10	105	160	113	1st	Kvalserien	10	4	4	2	15	25	27	4th
2014–15	HockeyAllsvenskan	52	25	14	13	95	168	122	3rd	Slutspelsserien Direktkval till SHL	5 7	1 4	3 2	1 1	8 —	8 23	13 18	3rd Winners

Players

Current roster

Updated on 21 October 2015.

#	Nat	Player	Pos	S/G	Age	Acquired	Birthplace
69		Oscar Alsenfelt	G	L	36	2015	Malmö, Sweden
2		Erik Andersson	D	L	42	2015	Umeå, Sweden
7		Nils Andersson (A)	D	R	32	2014	Umeå, Sweden
22		Jeremias Augustin	D	L	38	2014	Växjö, Sweden
55		Johan Björk	D	L	39	2015	Malmö, Sweden
23		Christoffer Forsberg	C/LW	L	30	2015	Östersund, Sweden
72		TJ Galiardi	C	L	36	2015	Calgary, Alberta, Canada
37		Jonas Gunnarsson	G	L	32	2014	Eksjö, Sweden
20		Henrik Hetta (C)	LW	L	34	2012	Strömsund, Sweden
39		Eric Himelfarb	C	R	41	2015	Thornhill, Ontario, Canada
16		Magnus Häggström (A)	C/RW	R	37	2012	Örnsköldsvik, Sweden
57		Johan Ivarsson	D	L	28	2014	Sweden
61		Nicklas Jadeland	W	L	37	2012	Malmö, Sweden
62		Jens Jakobs	RW	R	39	2014	Säter, Sweden
3		Kent McDonell	RW	R	45	2015	Williamstown, Ontario, Canada
14		Derek Meech	D	L	40	2015	Winnipeg, Manitoba, Canada
88		Peter Mueller	W	R	36	2015	Bloomington, Minnesota, United States
31		Mika Noronen	G	L	44	2015	Tampere, Finland
28		Jens Olsson	D	L	39	2012	Malmö, Sweden
90		Mattias Persson	W	L	39	2012	Bohus-Malmön, Sweden
96		Kim Rosdahl	LW	R	27	2013	Malmö, Sweden
40		Pontus Sjögren	G	L	39	2011	Stockholm, Sweden
9		Frederik Storm	W	L	35	2012	Gentofte, Denmark
91		Björn Svensson	W	L	37	2013	Ljungby, Sweden
11		Joey Tenute	C	L	41	2013	Hamilton, Ontario, Canada
12		Andreas Thuresson	C/LW	R	36	2015	Kristianstad, Sweden
6		Stefan Warg	D	R	34	2014	Stockholm, Sweden

Notable players

Retired numbers

Malmö Redhawks retired numbers

No.	Player	Position	Career	No. retirement
25	Kaj Olsson	Left wing	1975–86	—
18	Patrik Sylvegård	Right wing	1987–99	21 September 2000
1	Peter Lindmark	Goaltender	1988–97	8 November 2011
5	Roger Nordström	Goaltender	1983–98	16 February 2015

Alumni:

• Philip Falcone (played in 1984), American hedge fund billionaire
• Peter Andersson
• Róbert Švehla (Slovakia)
• Raimo Helminen (Finland)
• Mats Näslund
• Mats Hallin
• Fedor Fedorov (Russia)
• Andreas Lilja
• Kim Johnsson
• Juha Riihijärvi (Finland)
• Daniel Rydmark
• Jani Hurme (Finland)
• Tomas Sandström
• Gustav Nyquist

All with experience from their respective national teams.

See also

• Ice hockey in Sweden

External links

• Official website (Swedish)
• Redhawks Support (Swedish) – official supporter club site

Preceded by Djurgårdens IF	Swedish ice hockey champions 1992	Succeeded by Brynäs IF
Preceded by Brynäs IF	Swedish ice hockey champions 1994	Succeeded by HV71