DEL League Stats
Köln Set New Audience European Record
Die Kölner Haie welcomed an average of 16,993 spectators to the home games in the PENNY DEL
16,993! That's how many spectators attended the Kölner Haie's home games in the main round of the 2023/2024 PENNY DEL season.
A new record. Not just for the KEC, but also for European ice hockey.
The Haie only set the previous record, which meant a new German record, in the last 2022/2023 season.
At that time, an average of 14,286 spectators (including playoffs) flocked to the KEC. In the current season, the Haie were able to clearly break their own record with over 2,700 more fans per game and thus 16,993 spectators per home game.
A total of over 423,000 spectators have already attended the Haie's home games this season.
The LANXESS Arena was sold out a total of six times this season; this had never happened before in almost 25 years of KEC in the Deutzer Arena.
With these audience numbers, the Haie are the European ice hockey club crowd for the first time in 22 years.
With an average of 16,993 spectators, the KEC replaces the Swiss top club SC Bern and is the crowd again in Europe for the first time since 2002.
The Swiss, who held the attendance record for 22 years in a row, welcomed an average of 15,490 spectators per home game this season.
With the strong attendance figures, the Haie also broke a European record.
Not only did the Haie replace SCB as the spectator crowd, with 16,993 spectators per home game they also improved the Bernese European record of 16,399 visitors from the 2016/2017 season.
If you compare the Sharks' spectator numbers with those of the North American NHL, the ice hockey league with the largest number of spectators in the world, it is noticeable that the KEC leaves some teams behind here too.
More specifically, six NHL teams (Columbus, Buffalo, Anaheim, San Jose, Winnipeg and Arizona) have fewer visitors per game than the Sharks this season.
PENNY DEL climbs to number 1 in Europe in terms of audience popularity
An average of 7,160 fans come to the main round - more than ever before.
This puts the league well above the previous record of 6,647 from the 2015/16 season - and at the same time has taken over the top position of all ice hockey leagues in Europe: it is the highest average attendance in the main round of all European leagues.
The PENNY DEL has pushed the previous leader, the Swiss National League (average audience: 7,131), out of first place and is only behind the National Hockey League (NHL) among the ice hockey leagues worldwide.
A total of almost 2.6 million spectators have come to the arenas of the 14 clubs this year.