Former Red Wings Player in Demand

In 34 games last season for the Detroit Red Wings, Austin Czarnik was collecting one point.

This season in the Swiss National League, Czarnik, is collecting points at a league-leading pace. And because of that, he’s going to be collecting a much bigger paycheck next season.

Playing for SC Bern, Czarnik is showing 9-18-27 totals through 22 games to top the Swiss scoring race. That’s already led to talks between him and the club on a contract extension for next season.

Austin Czarnik impresses as Player of the Weekend 💥 3 goals and 1 assist over 2 games, what a performance! 💪🔥#nationalleague #playeroftheweekend #scbern

📸 Andrea Branca pic.twitter.com/nqtqOh2g9v

— National League (@NLch_official) November 5, 2024

However, it would appear that he may be running his race for another squad come the 2025-26 campaign. There are already published reports that rival Swiss National League club Lausanne HC is going to swoop in and sign the 31-year-old Detroit-born Czarnik to play for them next season. Apparently, tampering with other team’s players isn’t an issue in Switzerland.

And Czarnik is the only former Red Wings player who looks ready to leave his time in Bern behind. Defenseman Patrik Nemeth is being linked to HC Fribourg-Gotteron for the 2025-26 campaign. Nemeth was a Detroit rearguard from 2019-21. The Swedish blueliner has spent the past two seasons with SC Bern.

Former Red Wings Czarnik Getting Some Discipline

In Swiss hockey, justice applies equally to everyone. Even the league’s top scorer.

Czarnik recently was sitting out a one-game suspension for spearing Alessio Bertaggia in the 29th minute of a November 23 game between SC Bern and Geneve-Servette HC. Game officials were issuing Czarnik a game misconduct penalty on the play.

As a requirement of the suspension, he will also be paying a fine of 2500 Swiss Francs. That converts to approximately 2819 US dollars.