All set for play-offs!

The first stage of the 2013-14 Kontinental Hockey League Championship, the regular season, has come to an end, and the final standings have determined the pairings for the conference quarter-finals: the first round of the play-offs for the Gagarin Cup.

And the teams which finished outside the top 8 places, and therefore failed to qualify, now know the identity of their opponents in the Nadezhda Cup

All rounds of the 2013-14 Gagarin Cup play-offs consist of a best-of-seven series, with the winner being the first team to record four victories. The teams are seeded by their final place in the conference standings, and the first round pairings are as follows:

Western Conference
1. Dynamo Moscow – 8. Lokomotiv Yaroslavl
2. SKA Saint Petersburg – 7. CSKA Moscow
3. Lev Prague – 6. Medvescak Zagreb
4. Donbass Donetsk – 5. Dinamo Riga

Games to be played on March 7, 8, 10, 11, and if necessary, on March 13, 15 and 17. Games 1, 2, 5 and 7 are to be played at the home of the team with the higher seeding. 

Eastern Conference
1. Metallurg Magnitogorsk – 8. Admiral Vladivostok 
2. Barys Astana – 7. Avtomobilist Yekaterinburg 
3. Ak Bars Kazan – 6. Sibir Novosibirsk 
4. Salavat Yulaev Ufa – 5. Torpedo Nizhny Novgorod

Games to be played on March 8, 9, 11, 12, and if necessary, on March 14, 16 and 18. Games 1, 2, 5 and 7 are to be played at the home of the team with the higher seeding.

The complete format and schedule for the 2013/14 Gagarin Cup playoffs can be found in English here. 

The first round of the Nadezhda Cup is as follows:

Western Conference
11. Slovan Bratislava – 14. Dinamo Minsk
12. Vityaz Moscow Region – BYE (Spartak Moscow withdrawn)

Eastern Conference
11. Ugra Khanty-Mansiysk – 14. Amur Khabarovsk 
12. Neftekhimik Nizhnekamsk – 13. Metallurg Novokuznetsk