Xaver Unsinn

Xaver Unsinn, nicknamed “Mister Eishockei” in Germany, played at two Winter Olympics with the German ice hockey team: 1952 at Oslo (8th), and 1960 at Squaw Valley (6th). In 1964 at Innsbruck he acted as chief coach of the team with Markus Egen and Engelbert Holderied. In 1975-77 and from 1981-90 he again became chief coach of the West German national team. In 1976 his team won the bronze medal at the Innsbruck Winter Olympics. Unsinn participated as player and a coach in six Olympic Games and 12 World Championships. He was best-known for always wearing a shepherd’s plaid hat in the coaching zone. A Swiss sports journalist called him once: “Salvador Dalí of spoken words”.

His coaching career also included stints at the German clubs ESV Kaufbeuren (1960-66), Preußen Krefeld (1967-68), Augsburger EV (1968-70), Düsseldorfer EG (1970-72), who won the German title in 1972, Berliner SC (1972-77), German Champions in 1974 and 1976 and EV Rosenheim (1977-78). He also coached SC Bern (1978-81) in Switzerland and they won the Swiss Championship in 1979. Unsinn was inducted into the German Ice Hockey Hall of Fame in 1988, and in 1998 was inducted into the International Hockey Hall of Fame in Toronto.

Between 1946-60 he played for EV Füssen and won the German Championship eight times 1949 and 1953-59, and in 1952 was on the winning Spengler Cup team. Unsinn won 72 international caps, scoring 24 goals. In 1953 he won the silver medal at the World Championships. In 1996 he was awarded the Bundesverdienstkreuz (Order of Merit of the Federal Republic of Germany).