Mathias Niederberger

Mathias Niederberger
Date of birth	November 26, 1992
place of birth	Dusseldorf , Germany
size	180 cm
Weight	80 kg
position	goalkeeper
Catch hand	Left
Career stations
until 2011	DEG Metro Stars
2011-2013	Barrie Colts
2013-2014	Manchester Monarchs Ontario Reign
2014-2015	Polar bears Berlin
2015-2020	Düsseldorfer EG
since 2020	Polar bears Berlin

Mathias Niederberger (born November 26, 1992 in Düsseldorf ) is a German ice hockey goalkeeper who has been under contract with the Eisbären Berlin in the German Ice Hockey League (DEL) since March 2020 . His father Andreas Niederberger was also a defender's ice hockey player and, like his son, played for DEG from 1986 to 1998, with which he was German champion five times.

Career

In Germany (2007-2011)

Mathias Niederberger began his career as an ice hockey player in his hometown in the youth department of the DEG Metro Stars , for whose U18 juniors he was active in the German youth league from 2007 to 2010 . In the 2007/08 season he also played for the U18 juniors of Ratinger Ice Aliens .

In the 2010/11 season the goalkeeper was at the age of 17, his debut for the first team of the DEG Metro Stars in the German Ice Hockey League when he 1 October 2010 at the 0: 3 defeat against EHC München whole during the Stood between the posts for 60 minutes. In the following years he came as a substitute goalkeeper behind the Canadian Jean-Sébastien Aubin to further DEL missions and continued to play for the U18 juniors of the DEG Metro Stars in the DNL. He was also equipped with a license for the upper division EV Duisburg .

Barrie Colts (2011-2013)

For the 2011/12 season Niederberger moved to the Barrie Colts in the Canadian Junior League Ontario Hockey League , which had selected the goalkeeper in the 2011 CHL Import Draft in the first round in 25th position.

For the 2012 NHL Entry Draft , the man from Düsseldorf hoped to be selected by a team from the North American professional league. The rights to Niederberger, although he performed well with the Barrie Colts this season, ultimately none of the thirty NHL teams secured. One reason for this reluctance on the part of the clubs is the fact that Niederberger is 1.80 m tall by comparison. Nevertheless, after the draft he got the chance to participate in the prospect camp of the Canadian Toronto Maple Leafs . The German goalkeeper immediately took up this offer in order to improve his reputation in the National Hockey League. Niederberger did not get a contract with an NHL club for the coming NHL season 12/13 , but was allowed to play another year with the Barrie Colts as one of three permitted overage players , i.e. players who have already passed their 20th birthday of the Ontario Hockey League. After the defeat in the final series of the OHL against the London Knights , the man from Düsseldorf moved back to Germany and signed a contract with the EHC Red Bull Munich in the DEL.

AHL and ECHL (2013-2014)

On June 26, 2013 Niederberger received an offer from the American Hockey League despite having already signed a contract with EHC Red Bull Munich : The Manchester Monarchs , the Los Angeles Kings farm team , tried to get the goalkeeper into the squad. The EHC Munich released the rights to the goalkeeper, who had only recently been engaged, to give the man from Düsseldorf a chance at an NHL recommendation. With this release from the old club, Niederberger was able to return to North America.

Return to Germany

In June 2014 Niederberger signed a contract with Eisbären Berlin and completed twelve missions for the team in the 2014/15 season before he was loaned to the Düsseldorfer EG in July 2015 to gain match practice. He was named the best DEL goalkeeper of the 2015/16 season , finished fifth with the DEG after the main round and was eliminated in the subsequent playoffs in the quarter-finals. In spring 2016, the loan was extended to the 2016/17 season . In March 2017, DEG announced that Niederberger had extended his contract to 2020. He and his team ended the 2016/17 and 2017/18 seasons in eleventh place in the table and thus could not qualify for the playoffs or pre-playoffs. After DEG rebuilt the team again after these disappointing results, they came in sixth after the main round in 2018/19 and Niederberger had the best catch quota of the DEL with 92.9 percent and was able to record the third best goalscoring rate with 2.19 goals per game. With the Swede Fredrik Pettersson-Wentzel he got a strong man at his side who played twenty games but did not come close to Niederberger's values. In the following season , DEG was fifth after the main round, but the playoffs were canceled due to the COVID-19 pandemic and no German champions were determined. At the DEL gala on March 28, 2020 Niederberger was elected goalkeeper of the year for the second time; With a catch rate of 93.02 percent, an average of 2.05 goals conceded and five shutouts in 46 games, he led the three main goalkeeper categories.

For the 2020/21 season, Niederberger returned to the Eisbären Berlin.

International

For Germany Niederberger took part in the U18 Junior World Championship in Division I 2010 , where he and his team achieved promotion to the top division. He contributed to this success with a goal average of 0.67 per game and a catch rate of 96.5 percent in his three missions.

In April 2016 he made his debut in the German national team at the Euro Hockey Challenge in the Czech Republic. Niederberger played his first major international tournament at the 2018 World Cup in Denmark . There he was nominated as the third goalkeeper and was used once, in which the Germans celebrated their first victory over Finland in 25 years.

Achievements and Awards

• 2012 OHL Goalkeeper of the Month for December
• 2016 DEL Goalkeeper of the Year
• 2020 DEL Goalkeeper of the Year

International

• 2012 Best goalkeeper in the U20 World Junior Championship in Division IA

Career statistics

				Regular season				Play-offs
season	team	league		Sp	ATM	SV%		Sp	ATM	SV%
2005/06	Düsseldorfer EG U16	School league		14th	3.31	-		-	-	-
2006/07	Düsseldorfer EG U16	School league		21st	2.86	-		4th	3.00	-
2007/08	DEG Ice Hockey U18	DNL		12	3.42	-		1	5.00	-
2007/08	Ratinger Ice Aliens U18	Youth Bundesliga		11	3.09	-		-	-	-
2008/09	DEG Ice Hockey U18	DNL		24	3.03	-		4th	4.80	-
2009/10	DEG Ice Hockey U18	DNL		27	3.05	92.2		10	2.77	92.8
2010/11	DEG Ice Hockey U18	DNL		4th	2.46	94.5		-	-	-
2010/11	DEG Metro Stars	DEL		8th	3.43	87.4		2	4.77	77.8
2010/11	Foxes Duisburg	Oberliga		-	2.67	-		3	2.00	-
2011/12	Barrie Colts	OHL		49	2.68	91.8		13	2.34	93.3
2012/13	Barrie Colts	OHL		56	2.34	93.3		22nd	2.60	92.8
2013/14	Manchester monarchs	AHL		6th	2.92	88.7		-	-	-
2013/14	Ontario Reign	ECHL		9	2.71	88.4		-	-	-
2014/15	Polar bears Berlin	DEL		11	2.64	91.0		1	0.00	100.0
2014/15	Dresden Ice Lions	DEL2		5	4.20	-		-	-	-
2015/16	Düsseldorfer EG	DEL		42	2.27	93.0		5	2.72	91.0
2016/17	Düsseldorfer EG	DEL		48	2.94	91.6		-	-	-
2017/18	Düsseldorfer EG	DEL		22nd	3.07	89.9		-	-	-
2018/19	Düsseldorfer EG	DEL

( Legend for the goalkeeper statistics: GP or Sp = total games; W or S = wins; L or N = defeats; T or U or OT = draws or overtime or shootout defeats; min. = Minutes; SOG or SaT = shots on goal; GA or GT = goals conceded; SO = shutouts ; GAA or GTS = goals conceded ; Sv% or SVS% = catch quota ; EN = empty net goal ; ¹  play-downs / relegation ; italics : statistics not complete)

Web links

Commons : Mathias Niederberger  - Collection of images, videos and audio files

• Mathias Niederberger at eliteprospects.com (English)
• Mathias Niederberger at eurohockey.com

Individual evidence

1. ↑ wz-newsline.de, Mathias Niederberger - like the father so also (almost) the son
2. ↑ Niederberger hopes for an NHL chance. waz.de, accessed on May 8, 2013 . 
3. ↑ Red Bull signs Mathias Niederberger under contract. (No longer available online.) Del.org, archived from the original on June 9, 2013 ; Retrieved June 27, 2013 . Info: The archive link was inserted automatically and has not yet been checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this notice.  
4. ↑ Mathias Niederberger changes from EHC Munich to AHL. sportal.de, accessed on June 27, 2013 . 
5. ↑ Mathias Niederberger receives approval for AHL. hockeyweb.de, accessed on January 5, 2018 . 
6. ↑ Eisbären Berlin - Eisbären sign Mathias Niederberger. In: www.eisbaeren-app.de. Retrieved April 11, 2016 . 
7. ↑ DEG commits Mathias Niederberger ( Memento of the original of July 21, 2015 in the Internet Archive ) Info: The archive link was inserted automatically and has not yet been checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this notice. on deg-eishockey.de; Retrieved July 17, 2015 
8. ↑ Eisbären Berlin: Mathias Niederberger is loaned out | Marvin Cüpper is coming. In: eisbaeren.de. Retrieved April 11, 2016 . 
9. ↑ Bernd Schwickerath: DEL honors Kreutzer and Niederberger. In: Westdeutsche Zeitung. Retrieved April 11, 2016 . 
10. ↑ Are the polar bears losing the best goalkeeper in the league? In: www.bz-berlin.de. Retrieved April 11, 2016 . 
11. ↑ RP ONLINE: Düsseldorfer EG: Mathias Niederberger will stay until 2020. Accessed on November 3, 2018 . 
12. ↑ Ice Hockey News from March 5, 2019, page 31
13. ↑ Berlin's Marcel Noebels is “Player of the Year” in the DEL - Mathias Niederberger, Maury Edwards, Tim Stützle and trainer Tom Pokel win in other categories. Retrieved March 29, 2020 . 
14. ↑ Bernd Jolitz: Mathias Niederberger to Berlin: DEG loses the best goalkeeper in the league. In: rp-online.de. February 28, 2020, accessed March 26, 2020 . 
15. ^ German Ice Hockey Federation eV: National team: In the end there was no strength | German Ice Hockey Federation eV In: www.deb-online.de. Retrieved April 6, 2016 .