In this series, the opening article will cover the 1920s and the memorable games and legendary events such as the 1928 St.Moritz Winter Olympic Games that are seen on the picture.
The early days of the sport
The birthplace of the sport is in Canada, more specifically on the training groups of a military base near Quebec. The soldiers were asked to clean the grounds of the facility, they started chasing sticks and branches with brooms across the frozen grounds. The soldiers ended up playing for hours and the first “hockey” game was played.
The popularity of the sport spread fast in the surrounding area. With the advent of the ice skate, players started to move faster on the ice, sticks were replaced by pucks which sped the game up even faster. As people started to pick up the game, by the start of the 20th century the game had spread to Europe as well, and was a sport during the 1920 Olympics.
Birth of Hungarian Hockey
The birth of Hungarian ice hockey can be traced back to 1927, however this is not completely true. 1927 is the founding year of the federation. The sport has been around much longer in Hungary.
Hungary had already been great on the ice in the early 1920s, Hungary had a number of skilled players and the national team was considered one of the elite national team in Europe. The City Park ice rink was opened in November 26th, 1926, which was one of the first ice rinks built in Europe. In the early years the facility was only open a couple months out of the year, despite this more and more people started to play the sport. In 1927 the Hungarian Skating Federation was founded, and within this the Hungarian Ice Hockey governing body, with Géza Látor being the first federation president. This was also the year that Hungary joined the International Ice Hockey Federation.
St.Moritz and the first Olympics
The first and for a long time the best club team, BKE (Budapest Skating Organization) made up most of the national team and were invited to a number international tournaments. One year after the founding of the of the federation Hungary participated in the Winter Olympic Games in St. Moritz Switzerland. The members of the Olympic team were: Miklós Barcza, Frigyes Barna, Tibor Heinrich, Péter Krempels, István Krepuska, Géza Lator, Sándor Minder, Géza Ordódy (goalie), József Révay, Béla Weiner, Frigyes Minder. Hungary was defeated in all three of their games, however they only lost by one or two goals. The expert opinion was that at the European championships that will be held in Budapest, Hungary will be a real hard opponent
European Championships in Budapest
1928 had one more important event, which was the European Championships that were held in Budapest. Károly Császár was named the vice president of the IIHF also this year. The BKE players prepared for the European Championships with two separate tournaments in which they finished in second place. The national team closed out their preparation with a 1-0 win over England. Unfortunately the European Championships did not go as well after a loss to Italy and a draw against Belgium. Overall Hungary finished in 6th place.
