Source: Keystone
From autumn 1991 to spring 1994 Friborg-Gottéron dominated the championship. However, despite Slawa Bykow / Andrej Chomutow, the Freiburg team never won the title. You lose three playoff finals in a row.
The HC Friborg-Gottéron won 170 points in these three seasons in qualification – on average ten points more per season than the competition. In the playoff finals it always went wrong: In 1992 SC Bern won the «Finalissima» in the St-Léonard Hall thanks to two goals by Patrick Howald with 4: 1, in the next two seasons the EHC Kloten proved to be too strong (3: 0 and 3: 1 wins in the finals).
“Everyone can have a dream that they could never achieve,” said Slawa Bykow, Friborg’s translator in this era, years later in an interview with “Sport”.
Friborg was able to cope with the first two final defeats against Bern (1992) and Kloten (1993). The third failure, however, destroyed the Freiburg dream team. At that time, Gottéron won the qualification by eleven points ahead of Kloten – at a time when there were only two points for a win. “We are ready for the championship title,” said Bykov before the final.
The Desperado tactic goes wrong
Until the final, Gottéron lost only one home game throughout the season (3: 4 a.V. against Ambri in the qualification). In the playoff final, however, both home games in the St-Léonard cauldron were lost to Kloten (4: 5 and 2: 4).
The reason? Gottéron played far too aggressively. “We played against the international trend,” said coach Paul-André Cadieux, “we wanted to push the offensive, even against defensive opponents.” The Desperado tactic always went wrong in the final.
Goalie and crowd favorite Dino Stecher was stamped as a scapegoat. In three of the four finals from 1994 Stecher conceded a durable, decisive goal. Stecher ran away from the club after the third lost playoff final: «I am now gone, now nobody can blame me for the defeats.» Stecher felt abandoned by coach Cadieux and his foremen.
“Rarely has a good team fallen apart faster”
Friborg could not adequately replace Stecher. The problems became more frequent: Slawa Bykow and Andrej Chomutow quarreled, Bykow was injured more and more often, the successful team of the past years fell apart. “Seldom has a good team fallen apart faster,” said Bykov with a little distance. In 1995 Gottéron made it to 5th place again and into the semi-finals. The following season, it wasn’t even enough for the playoffs.
26 years have passed since then. SVP politician Roger Köppel still worked as a sports editor at the NZZ in 1994. We quote from his match report on Friborg’s failure against Kloten: «Friborg’s attacking game crumbled under the counter pressure of a highly organized opponent. Too often, one’s own virtuosity was only the cause of goals conceded. … The audience also took an active part in the game, either by spitting on the excellent referee or throwing lighters and other cultural goods on the ice. … (Marc) Leuenberger would have to disguise the bounce phase before the fake foul to be really credible. »
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