Sparta Praha

About club

HC Sparta Praha is one of the most successful and famous clubs in Czechoslovakian and later Czech ice hockey history. There are no names in Czech sports better recognized internationally than "Sparta" and few clubs have as much history.

Sparta’s first period of great success was in the years following World War II, as it won two national titles in a row – 1952/54 and 1953/54 – under the name Spartak Sokolovo. The next highly successful period came much more recently when Sparta won the Czechoslovakian league in 1989/90 and in 1992/93. After a few years of bad luck and less success, Sparta returned to the top of the Czech Extraliga in 1999/00 when they were crowned league champions. That victory was the first of four championships they would win over seven seasons, adding Extraliga titles in 2002, 2006 and 2007.

In addition to those domestic achievements, Sparta was also highly competitive in European club hockey. In 1997, the team reached the European Hockey League semi-finals, and then three years later reached the final – the first time in 11 years that a Czech team had gone so far in Europe – and fell in a tight game to Russia's Metallurg Magnitogorsk. In 2008, Sparta reached the final of the European Champions Cup, once again falling to Magnitogorsk, and then in 2017 reached the final of the Champions Hockey League, where they took powerful Frölunda Gothenburg to overtime before falling in a thrilling contest.