HC Sibir Novosibirsk

Hockey Club Sibir Novosibirsk Oblast, also known as HC Sibir or Sibir Novosibirsk, is a Russian professional ice hockey team based in Novosibirsk. They are members of the Chernyshev Division in the Kontinental Hockey League. History Ice hockey was introduced to Novosibirsk in 1948 by Ivan Tsyba, who returned from a hockey seminar in Moscow with equipment to play the sport. Immediately popular amongst the populace, the local sports society, Dynamo, decided to establish a hockey team. The first hockey rink was built in autumn 1948 near the Ob River. A second rink was built in February 1949, at the Spartak Stadium. Several teams played in Novosibirsk in this era, the strongest being Dynamo. They were promoted to the Soviet Championship League for the 1954–55 season, finishing in ninth place overall, out of ten teams. They would finish as high as ninth two more times in the Soviet era, in both 1956–57 and 1959–60 (when the league had 16 and 18 teams, respectively). A youth team was formed in 1954, to serve as a development club for the senior team. In its first season of play, it won bronze in the national championship. In 1962, owing to financial difficulties, Dynamo merged with another team in Novosibirsk, Khimik. Though Dynamo played in the top division, its equipment was of a lesser quality than Khimik, which played in the lowest division and was run by a local chemical factory; the resulting team was renamed Sibir Novosibirsk. During the first decades of its history, Sibir was subsequently relegated between the elite and second-rate divisions of the Soviet and Russian hockey championships until it finally settled in the Superleague after the 2002–03 season.