Austrian National Day

On this date in 1955 Austria's Parliament issued The Declaration of Neutrality, declaring the country permanently neutral as a part of the Constitution of Austria. The declaration was as a result of Austria being occupied by the Allied Forces (the Soviet Union, the United States, the United Kingdom and France) following World War II from 1945 to 1955. The occupation was ended with the Austria State Treaty of May 15, 1955, which re-established Austria as an independent and democratic sovereign state.

The Soviets would not have agreed to the treaty if Austria had not committed to declare it's neutrality following the withdrawal of the Allies. As a result of the treaty, the Allies left on October 25, 1955 and the Declaration of Neutrality was enacted the next day, October 26, 1955, the first day of their return to independence, and a date now celebrated as a national holiday known as Austrian National Day.

The Austrian Parliament

On Austrian National Day, memorial ceremonies take place, the main one being the Federal President and Federal Minister of Defense attending a ceremony at the Heldenplatz, a large public space in front of Hofburg Palace in Vienna known as Heroes' Square, during which the President lays a wreath at the tomb of the Unknown Soldier. He later  gives a state of the union speech on TV later that day.

Ceremonies taking place on Austrian National Day

Additionally, flags fly everywhere, concerts and held, new recruits are sworn into the Austrian military, federal museums offer free admission to further the public understanding of Austrian history, and, somewhat uniquely, "fitness marches" are held, which are organized hikes throughout the country to promote fitness and raise awareness of a healthy life style, which attract 100,000 participants annually.

The Austria National Hockey Team is currently ranked 16th in the IIHF World Rankings.

The Austrians have participated in the Olympics in ice hockey 13 times since 1928, with their best result being an 7th place in 1936 and a 8th place in 1948 and again in 1976. 2014 was the first time Austria had qualified for the Olympic tournament since 2002 and they finished classified 10th, their best showing since 9th in 1988. In order to participate at the 2014 Games in Sochi, Russia, the then ranked 15th Austrians had to survive a Qualification Tournament hosted by the 10th ranked Germans.

Austria battles Germany for the right to participate in the 2014 Olympics

Austria entered the 2014 Olympics with three NHLers on it's roster, Michael Grabner and Thomas Vanek of the New York Islanders and Michael Raffl of the Philadelphia Flyers.

Vanek celebrates a goal

Austria has participated in the World Championships dating as far back as 1930, with regular participation since 1959. Austria has won bronze medals at the World Championships in both 1931 and 1947.

Since 1951, Austria was either in Pool B or Pool C nearly exclusively from 1951 to 1992, before a run of 12 out of 13 years in the Top Division before beginning the roller coaster of promotions (2006, 2008, 2010, 2012 and 2014) and relegations (2005, 2007, 2009, 2011, 2013 and 2015), including a bitter relegation in 2009 only because 15th place Germany were saved from their rightful demotion by being scheduled as hosts for the 2010 tournament, which granted the Germans an exemption from relegation for 2009, which sent the 14th place Austrians down to Division I for 2010 instead.

Frequent Austrian National Team captain Gerhard Unterluggauer

Vanek, now a member of he Minnesota Wild, leads all Austrian-born players by far in career NHL scoring with 614 career points, trailed by Grabner at 157. Raffl is third with 51 and all three are still active in the NHL.

Vanek at the 2004 World Championships

The other Austrians to have played in the NHL are Andreas Nodl (36 points with Philadelphia and Carolina), defenseman Thomas Pock (17 with the Rangers and Islanders), Christophe Brandner, the first Austrian to play and score a goal in the NHL in 2003, (9 points with Minnesota) and goaltender Reinhard Divis, who won six games for St. Louis in four seasons.

Reinhard Divis

Today's featured jersey is a 1997 Austrian National Team Christoph Brandner jersey as worn in the 1997 World Championships "B" pool. The "waving flag" style of international jerseys were introduced in 1996 and are best known for being used in the 1996 World Cup of Hockey. They were also used in the various World Championships in 1997 before a new style was debuted for the 1998 Winter Olympic Games in Japan.

Brandner scored a goal and two assists in seven game for Austria at the 1997 World Championships. In 2003 Brandner became the first Austrian to play in the NHL and then became the first Austrian to score an NHL goal on October 12, 2009.

Bonus jersey: Today's bonus jersey is a 2004 Austria National Team Thomas Vanek jersey as worn in the World Junior Championships in Finland. Austria first wore this jersey style in 1998 and continued to wear it through 2004.

Two distinctive features of this jersey are the fine details of the trim running down the arms and the unique font for the numbers on the back, which are much more at home on a soccer jersey.

Extra bonus jersey: Today's extra bonus jersey is a 2005 Austria National Team Gerhard Unterluggauer jersey as worn during the 2005 World Championships, which were held in Austria. This was an unfortunately short lived style, as all national teams received attractive new jerseys for 2005 only to see them replaced with the new Nike Swift styles for the 2006 Olympics.

The now 39 year old Unterluggauer, a defenseman, began his pro career back in the 1992-93 season, playing his entire career in Austria save for a three year stint in the German DEL in the early 2000's. He has won the Austrian championship twice, in 1993 and 1999.

He has been playing for the Austria National Team since 1993 and his resume includes three Olympic Games (1998, 2002 and 2014) and 19 World Championships.

Today's video section are highlights of the final day of Olympic qualifying, highlighted by Austria's vital game against Germany, which sent the Austrians to Sochi.

Next, showing Austria is not to be taken lightly, they dominate Latvia 6-3 at the 2014 World Championships.

2002-03 University of Minnesota Thomas Vanek Jersey

Following the loss of future NHLers leading scorer center Johnny Pohl, second leading scorer center Jeff Taffe and third leading scorer, captain and Hobey Baker Award winner defenseman Jordan Leopold, the defending national champion University of Minnesota Golden Gophers reloaded for 2002-03 with a new offensive weapon, Thomas Vanek.

Vanek, a native of Austria came from the Sioux Falls Stampede of the United States Hockey League, where he led the USHL in goals (46), assists (45) and points (91) in 53 games, outdistancing his nearest competitor by 15 points.

The Gophers opened their defense of their title by defeating Ohio State 7-2 at the Xcel Energy Center in the annual Hall of Fame Game in front of 15,204 fans. Highlights of their regular season included a five game winning streak in December, which included a two-game sweep on the road at rival Wisconsin, and exhibition win over the Italy National Team and winning their annual holiday tournament with wins over Yale and nationally ranked Boston College.

February saw a four game winning streak with a victory at Colorado College, another sweep of Wisconsin, this time at home, and a win up in Duluth over the University of Minnesota Duluth.

Minnesota finished the WCHA regular season with a 15-6-7 conference record (20-2-2 overall), good for second place in the WCHA with future NHL defensemen Paul Martin and Keith Ballard and forward Vanek being named to the All-WCHA Second Team following a 31 goal, 62 point season, which was good for sixth in the nation.

By finishing second in the WCHA, Minnesota hosted ninth place Michigan Tech and advanced to the WCHA Final Five on the basis of a pair of 3-1 and 5-2 wins.

Their next opponent was the Minnesota State Mavericks, who finished with an identical 15-6-7 WCHA record. The Gophers advanced with a narrow 3-2 overtime win in front of 17,012 spectators to meet WCHA regular season champions Colorado College. In the championship game Minnesota prevailed with a 4-2 win to capture the Broadmoor Trophy as WCHA playoff champions.

Five teams were picked that season for the NCAA National Tournament, with Minnesota being named the #1 seed in the West Regional played at their home rink at Mariucci Arena where they would face #4 seed Mercyhurst.

Minnesota advanced with a 9-2 win over the Lakers to face the Ferris State Bulldogs, 5-2 winners over North Dakota. Minnesota extended their winning streak to six games by easily advancing to the Frozen Four in Buffalo, New York by a final score of 7-4.

Their semi-final opponent in Buffalo would be traditional college hockey powerhouse the Michigan Wolverines. Michigan got on the scoreboard first, halfway through the first period on a goal off of a faceoff to take a 1-0 lead. The Wolverines would extend their lead to 2-0 before Vanek would get Minnesota on the board with two minutes remaining in the second period.

A minute and a half into the third period Gino Guyer pulled the Gophers even with a goal from the slot. The remainder of the third period was a tense, close fought battle that settled nothing and the contest went into overtime, where Vanek set Minnesota to their second consecutive national championship game when he came out from behind the Wolverines net after reversing course and put a sharp angle shot through the goaltender to win the game for Minnesota.

Their opponents were Hockey East champions, the New Hampshire Wildcats. Minnesota went out on top at the nine minute mark on a shot from the point by Martin but New Hampshire even the score with less than 20 seconds remaining on a power play goal that was banked in off Minnesota goalie Travis Weber.

The second period was played scoreless, as was the first eight minutes of the third before Vanek took control of the game, first with a nifty play after receiving the puck at the blueline on a three-on-two. Once into the left faceoff circle, Vanek slammed on the brakes, cut to the middle of the ice, losing his defensman in the process. He then drew the goalie out who went down as he cut around him to the right, easily putting the puck into the open net to put the Gophers up 2-1 with 11:46 remaining.

With 8:43 remaining, Vanek split the defense to create a scoring chance which was stopped. Jon Waibel gathered up the rebound and executed a nice give and go with Vanek to create some space and fired the puck in from 15 feet out to extend Minnesota's lead to 3-1 with an assist from Vanek.

Barry Tallackson slammed in a pass from the side of the net on a Gopher power play with 6 1/2 minutes remaining to put the game out of reach at 4-1 and the Gophers added an empty net goal to make the final score 5-1 to take their second consecutive NCAA national championship and Vanek was named the Frozen Four's Most Outstanding Player.

Vanek would subsequently be drafted #5 overall in that spring's NHL Entry Draft and return to Buffalo as a member of the Sabres.

Today's featured jersey is a Mission 2002-03 University of Minnesota Golden Gophers Thomas Vanek jersey. Minnesota had won the national title the year before wearing identical jerseys made by Nike, but changed to Mission jerseys for the 2002-03 season.

This jersey features the 2003 Frozen Four patch worn by all four teams at that year's Frozen Four, Minnesota, New Hampshire, Michigan and Cornell. Minnesota wore their white jerseys for both games in Buffalo.

Today's first video is an excellent recap of the Minnesota Gophers 2003 Frozen Four.

Next up is a great collection of Vanek highlights while he was with the Golden Gophers featuring the outstanding announcing of Frank Mazzocco.

2004 Austria National Team Thomas Vanek Jersey

Born on this date in 1984, Thomas Vanek grew up in Austria before coming to the United States at age 14, where he played three seasons of junior hockey for the Sioux Falls Stampede of the USHL. During this the 2001-02 season he would also skate for Austria at the Division 1 World Junior Championships, hosted by his native Austria. Vanek would finish second in tournament scoring with 11 points in five games and lead Austria to the Championship Final, coming away with a silver medal after a loss to Germany.

He next played for the University of Minnesota, starting in the 2002-03 season when he led the Golden Gophers in goals, as well as the nation, with 31, assists (31) and points (62) during the regular season, becoming the first freshman to lead Minnesota in scoring in 33 years. He followed up his successful regular season by being named the MVP of the Frozen Four as he scored the game winning goals in both the semi-finals and finals as Minnesota captured the 2003 national championship in Buffalo, New York.

He must have made an impression on the Sabres staff, as Buffalo took Vanek fifth overall in the 2003 NHL Entry Draft later that year, the highest ever draft position by an Austrian.

After another year at Minnesota where he led the team in goals (26) and points (51), Vanek would compete for Austria first at the 2004 World Junior Championships in January and then the World Championships, where he led the team with seven points in six games.

The NHL lockout of 2004-05 ensured that Vanek would spend the entire season with the Rochester Americans of the AHL, where he amassed 42 goals (leading all rookies and placing second in the league) and 68 points in 74 games to finish second in team scoring, as the Americans finished with the best record in the league.

Vanek moved up to the NHL for the 2005-06 season and scored 25 goals and 48 points in his rookie season. 2006-07 proved to be his finest season to date, with 43 goals and 84 points as well as having the best plus/minus rating that year with a +47. In the postseason, Vanek would contribute ten points in 16 games as the Sabres make a deep playoff run, making it to the Eastern Conference Finals in their final season in the black and red jerseys.

In 2008-09, he would score the 10,000th goal in Sabres history on December 13 and be named to his first NHL All-Star Game in 2009. He finished the season with 40 goals despite missing nine games after suffering a broken jaw after being hit by a slapshot.

Today's featured jersey is a 2004 Austria National Team Thomas Vanek jersey as worn in the World Junior Championships in Finland. While Austria's performance at the 2004 World Juniors was not a very memorable, we chose to replicate Vanek's jersey from this tournament due to his wearing the captian's "C" and his familiar college and NHL #26, rather than the #15 he wore with the senior team at the World Championships.

Two distinctive features of this jersey are the fine details of the trim running down the arms and the unique font for the numbers on the back, which are much more at home on a soccer jersey.

Our first video is an interesting interview with Vanek discussing his journey from Austria to the NHL followed by a compilation of Vanek goals from his time with the University of Minnesota and the Buffalo Sabres, which gives a nice retrospective of the jerseys Vanek has worn throughout his career, as Buffalo has had quite a number of jerseys during Vanek's first few NHL seasons.

Here is Vanek being taken by the Sabres in the 2003 draft with commentary by Pierre McGuire and Bob McKenzie, who seems more excited than usual.

Now on a roll, we present a pair of goals by Vanek from the 2008 World Championships, a Vanek seems to have located a weakness in the Dutch goalies game on his glove side that you could drive a truck through.

We are going to post this one as an example of how NOT to do a youtube video. First, never, ever interrupt a Rick Jeanneret call of a goal. Never.

Next, where's the replay up close so we can see exactly what happened? C'mon, youtube gives you ten minutes to work with and you give us 20 seconds? People, work with us here…