HK Zemgale/LBTU

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HK Zemgale/LBTU
HK Zemgale-LLU logo.png
City: Jelgava, Latvia
League: OHL
Founded: 2002[1]
Home Arena: Jelgava Ice hall
Colors: Blue, red, white
              [2]
Parent club(s): Dinamo Riga (OHL)[3]
Franchise history
2002–2003: ASK/Zemgale[1]
2003–present: HK Zemgale
HK Zemgale.gif

HK Zemgale/LBTU is a Latvian professional ice hockey team that plays in the Latvian Hockey League. The team is based in Jelgava and play their home games at the Jelgava Ice hall.

History

The team was founded in 2002, shortly after the opening of the Jelgava Ice hall, in cooperation with the Ministry of Defence.[1] The team was initially called ASK/Zemgale, and joined the Latvian Hockey League, in addition the team also participated in Division 2 of the Eastern European Hockey League during the 2002–03 season. At the culmination of the season, financial issues meant that the team split in two, with the ASK franchise relocating to Ogre, creating ASK/Ogre, whilst the Zemgale side of the partnership remained in the town, operating under the name HK Zemgale.[1] The team remained in the Latvian first tier for two further seasons before disbanding following the culmination of the 2004–05 season.

Zemgale remained inactive until the 2010–11 season, when they reformed and returned to the Latvian top tier,[1] where they have played since. Usually a mid-table team,[2] HK Zemgale's most successful season came in the 2017-18 season where they made it to the play-off final, ultimately losing to HK Kurbads,[4] under Head Coach Haralds Vasiljevs.[5]

In 2013, the team established a partnership with the Latvia University of Life Sciences and Technologies (Latvian: Latvijas Lauksaimniecības universitāte (LLU)).[6][7] In addition, Zemgale also serve as the farm team to the KHL's Dinamo Riga.[3] During the 2020/21 season, David Levin played a handful of games for the team whilst under contract with Dinamo.[8]

Season-by-season record

Note: GP = Games played, W = Wins, L = Losses, T = Ties, OTL = Overtime losses, Pts = Points, GF = Goals for, GA = Goals against, PIM = Penalties in minutes

Season League GP W L T OTW OTL Pts GF GA Finish Playoffs
2015–16 Latvian Hockey League 30 17 11 1 1 54 137 87 4th Quarter-final loss
2016–17 Latvian Hockey League 30 18 7 2 3 61 137 85 3rd Semi-final loss
2017–18 Optibet Hockey League 30 12 13 4 1 45 87 94 4th Final loss
2018–19 Optibet Hockey League 35 20 11 2 2 66 138 89 2nd Semi-final loss
2019–20 Optibet Hockey League 35 15 14 2 4 38 138 105 5th Playoffs cancelled

References

This page uses Creative Commons Licensed content from Wikipedia (view authors).