win2day ICE Hockey League kicks off on Friday with block­buster Salzburg vs KAC

For win2day, Friday marks the start of its second full season as title sponsor – and the new campaign has its own motto: “At win2day, we are looking forward to a strong season full of ice hockey highlights.

As the gaming platform of Österreichische Lotterien and Austria’s only licensed provider of online gambling, we stand unequivocally for fair play. Together with the win2day ICE Hockey League, we are dedicating the coming season entirely to the motto ‘Long live FairPlay’ and will make this spirit tangible through our activations,” explains Georg Wawer, Managing Director of win2day.

‘Fair Play Puck’ to be introduced

To reflect the strengthened motto, the ‘Fair Play Puck’ will be introduced from the 2023/24 season: before every win2day ICE Hockey League game, the captains of both teams will sign a puck during the greeting of the referees – thereby also committing themselves to fair play in this way. The puck specially created by win2day will be marked with the date and made available to clubs and the title sponsor for promotional purposes.

Euro 5.000 donation total

As in the previous year, head coaches and players from the 13 clubs, along with representatives and guests of title sponsor win2day and the ICE Hockey League, gathered on Monday for a charity poker tournament played in Texas hold’em. win2day put up Euro 5.000,- for the tournament, which could be donated to a charitable cause selected by the winner.

Former beach volleyball world championship runner-up Clemens Doppler claimed victory, prevailing over Dylan Standley (PIV) and Raphael Andergassen (PUS) at the final table. Doppler is donating the prize money to Ronald McDonald Kinderhilfe.

Traditional season-opening press conference

The traditional season-opening press conference was then held at Casino Velden on Tuesday, initially looking back at the season just concluded: above all, the play-offs – with more than 170.000 spectators in total – and the final series between Salzburg and Bozen, which went to seven games, provided excellent promotion for the multinational league. In addition, the league’s media value, at almost Euro 87 million, was once again at a very high level.

Both figures are also achieved through the international nature of the win2day ICE Hockey League. For league president Jochen Pildner Steinburg, this is a valuable unique selling point: “Internationality is the hallmark of the win2day ICE Hockey League. Our league has developed so well that we are now a flagship project in Europe. There is no better international league structure of our kind in Central Europe,” states President Jochen Pildner-Steinburg. This unique selling point is also set to be a central pillar of the new repositioning process.

“We are constantly considering how we can better position the win2day ICE Hockey League – including how we present ourselves externally. We need to become more modern. To that end, we have developed a concept that we can implement throughout the coming season. This will happen step by step. The aim is to position our league so that it receives even more attention in Europe and also meets the expectations of the fans.”

New streaming offering brings every game live

Following the positive feedback from last season, the league was keen to expand its streaming offering. It has therefore decided to introduce pay-per-view streaming of all games – with the exception of live games on host broadcaster PULS 24 – on the platform www.live.ice.hockey . At least four camera positions will ensure a consistent standard.

There are several options for fans: from the previously offered single-game purchase, to a subscription for a club’s home and away games, through to a league pass that includes every game. “With the start of the new season, we can offer every game live for the first time. The majority on live.ice.hockey, with selected games on PULS 24. This also gives us the opportunity to launch subscription packages for the first time. Our next ‘step’ is to bring the clubs’ productions up to a common standard, then develop them further and supplement them with high-quality programme content,” says Christian Feichtinger, Managing Director of the win2day ICE Hockey League.

Season gets under way on Friday

The renewed chase of defending champions EC Red Bull Salzburg begins on Friday. The clash between the eight-time league champions and EC-KAC will be broadcast live and exclusively on free-to-air TV, Joyn and www.puls24.at/eishockey (without geoblocking) by ICE host broadcaster PULS 24 from 18.45 Uhr. The 45-minute build-up includes a comprehensive review of the two-day kick-off event in Velden as well as a detailed preview of the 2023/24 season.

>> Go to the game centre with schedule

>> Go to the official website of the win2day ICE Hockey League