The former top striker and red jacket captain Christoph Brandner, who has been working as a coach in the EC-KAC organization for twelve years, will be the new assistant coach of the fighting team.
The EC-KAC is pleased to announce that the position of assistant coach of the fighting team has been filled by Christoph Brandner. The club icon, who has been working as a coach in the organization since 2014, will be David Fischer’s successor and will henceforth form the Red Jackets’ professional coaching team together with head coach Kirk Furey and goaltending coach Andrej Hočevar.
Successful playing career in Austria, Germany and the NHL
Christoph Brandner grew up in Kapfenberg, but moved to the EC-KAC at the age of 21, where he has been a member since then, with the exception of the period between 2000 and 2008 – first as a player, later as a coach. As an active player, the Styrian developed into one of the strongest Austrian strikers of his generation. With 99 goals in 198 league games for the Red Jackets between 1996 and 2000, he was recommended for a foreign commitment in the DEL, where he not only became the top goalscorer and player of the year in 2003, but also led the Krefeld Pinguine to the second and last German championship title in their history. Just six months later, Christoph Brandner, wearing the Minnesota Wild jersey, became the first Austrian-born player to score a goal in the NHL.
After further international positions in Houston (USA), Södertälje (Sweden) and Hamburg (Germany), the attacker returned to EC-KAC in 2008. He led the Red Jackets, with whom he reached the final series three times during this period, as captain for four years and scored a further 82 goals in 218 league games for Klagenfurt until the end of his career in 2012. A total of three championship titles with the EC-KAC – won in 2000, 2001 and 2009 – adorn his CV, and he took part in eight World Championships and two Olympic Games with the national team.
Twelve years of experience as a trainer at EC-KAC
Christoph Brandner has been active as a coach in the EC-KAC organization since 2014: in a total of eight seasons (2014 to 2017 and 2018 to 2023) he worked as a development coach across age groups, in two seasons (2017/18 in the combat team and 2023/24 in the future team) he acted as an assistant coach and most recently he was head coach of the red and white team for two years U18 teams. At the same time, the former striker is a long-time member of the coaching staff of the Austrian senior national team: this year’s World Cup in Switzerland will be his seventh as assistant coach of Team Austria, where he also works alongside Kirk Furey under Roger Bader.
Oliver Pilloni on the decision for Brandner
General Manager Oliver Pilloni: “After David Fischer’s departure, we received a lot of applications, but we were and are of the opinion that we already had the best possible successor candidate in our own club. Christoph Brandner has achieved and seen everything as a player, and as a coach he has held different positions with us over the past twelve years, but they all had a common denominator, namely the training and development work with our young players. He is now also bringing this expertise to our professional area, in which we are known to have more self-made players “Christoph Brandner and Kirk Furey have worked very well together in the national team in recent years, and they have also worked together on many occasions at the EC-KAC for almost two decades. We have found an exciting solution to fill the position of assistant coach, which we are convinced will lead to the continued success of our fighting team.”
eckac.at Image: HCI / PAPA Productions
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