lit a candle 2h ago85 is no age to go, my uncle went the same quiet way last spring, no warning, just a phone call on a Sunday. Never met the man but I read his name in every old Dinamo Riga program I could find. Sorry for his family.
Their story
Ēvalds Grabovskis was a Latvian ice hockey coach, administrator and historian of the game. He was twice head coach of Dinamo Riga in the Soviet league, led the national teams of Bulgaria, Poland and Latvia, and won four Polish championships with Podhale Nowy Targ. He died on 11 October 2026,…
Ēvalds Grabovskis was a Latvian ice hockey coach, administrator and historian of the game. He was twice head coach of Dinamo Riga in the Soviet league, led the national teams of Bulgaria, Poland and Latvia, and won four Polish championships with Podhale Nowy Targ. He died on 11 October 2026, aged 85.
He was born in Riga on 2 March 1941. As a teenager he took up cycling, swimming and hockey, and he went on to study at the Latvian State Institute of Physical Culture. He played as a defenceman for Riga teams including Daugava, the club that later became Dinamo, in the 1960s.
He began coaching in 1974 as an assistant at Dinamo Riga, where he worked alongside Viktor Tikhonov and later Vladimir Yurzinov. In 1977 he succeeded Tikhonov as head coach and led the team until 1980, and he returned for a second spell from the late 1980s to 1991. Between those spells he coached Bulgaria at the 1980 World Championship Pool C and worked with Latvijas Bērzs and other Latvian teams.
In 1992 he moved to Poland to coach Podhale Nowy Targ, and at the same time he became head coach of the Polish national team, which he led at the Pool B World Championships of 1993 and 1994. In Nowy Targ he was known as a strict, demanding coach who rebuilt a struggling club and won four national titles in two spells, the second of which ended in 1998. He also coached EV Landsberg in Germany. In 1995 he took charge of Latvia at the Pool B World Championship, and he later served as an assistant coach at the 1998 and 1999 top-division tournaments.
Grabovskis worked for many years as an administrator at the Latvian Ice Hockey Federation, including as its executive director, and helped with its youth teams. He became a researcher of the sport's history, created a travelling exhibition on Latvian hockey, and wrote two books, "Hokeja elpas skartie" (2016) and "Hokeja ģimene" (2022). On his initiative a remembrance day for hockey veterans was established on 30 September. The federation gave him its lifetime achievement award in 2019.
The Latvian Ice Hockey Federation announced his death on Sunday 11 October 2026, saying that his contribution to Latvian hockey would remain an important part of its history. Only a week earlier he had attended the remembrance day he had founded. The cause of death was not made public. He was buried at Baltezers Cemetery on 16 October 2026.
Biography adapted from Wikipedia (Ēvalds Grabovskis, lv and pl; Грабовский, Эвалд Артурович, ru; CC BY-SA 4.0); LSM Sporta redakcija (11 October 2026); TVNET/LETA (11 and 16 October 2026); SportowePodhale.pl (Stefan Leśniow. Wikipedia ↗
In their own words
“Jeśli chcesz, by cię szanowano, to nie odpuszczaj żadnych zawodów, nawet gdy tytuł masz w kieszeni. Po tym poznaje się prawdziwego mistrza.”
A saying of his widely quoted in Polish sport (If you want to be respected, do not ease off in any competition, even when the title is in your pocket. That is how you recognise a true champion.)
“Viņa ieguldījums Latvijas hokejā un sporta attīstībā paliks nozīmīga mūsu hokeja vēstures daļa.”
Latvian Ice Hockey Federation announcing his death on 11 October 2026 (His contribution to Latvian hockey and the development of sport will remain an important part of our hockey history.)
Photos
1Ēvalds Grabovskis in 2012
by People Forever
From social media
6Posts by Ēvalds, and posts about them, kept here so they are not lost.