KHL announces the final team placements for the 2019-20 season

Because of the curtailment of the 2019-20 KHL season, the league has decided that it cannot announce a KHL champion, nor award the Gagarin Cup.

As usual, the season saw the KHL championship and the Russian Hockey Championship scheduled to take place in two stages. The first stage determined the winner of the regular season and the 16 participants in the playoffs. The second stage, which could not be completed, would have given us the Gagarin Cup winner, the Russian champion, and the other medal winning teams.

That second phase of the championship was interrupted after the Conference Quarter finals, due to government decisions aimed at controlling the coronavirus pandemic. As a result, the league had no choice but to cancel the remainder of the season.

With the season incomplete, there is no way that a Gagarin Cup winner and other prize winners can be fairly chosen based on the results of the regular season. To announce a champion based on the regular season and one round of the playoffs would violate the sporting integrity of the competition.

As a result, the KHL has drawn up a final table as seen below. The eight teams that qualified for the second round of the playoffs are allocated a single position, 1-8. They are ranked equally and listed alphabetically. The order in which they appear has no implication about any team’s placement in relation to any other:

The 16 remaining teams, whose seasons were already completed when the curtailment was announced, can be placed as usual according to points 7-8 of Article 24 of the KHL’s sporting regulations:

9. Avangard Omsk
10. Avtomobilist Yekaterinburg
11. Spartak Moscow
12. Lokomotiv Yaroslavl
13. Metallurg Magnitogorsk
14. Vityaz Moscow Region
15. Torpedo Nizhny Novgorod
16. Neftekhimik Nizhnekamsk
17. Amur Khabarovsk
18. Kunlun Red Star
19. HC Sochi
20. Severstal Cherepovets
21. Traktor Chelyabinsk
22. Admiral Vladivostok
23. Dinamo Riga
24. Dinamo Minsk

The Russian Hockey Federation has drawn up a separate procedure to determine the Russian Champion for the 2019-20 season, and to award silver and bronze medals to the second and third-placed teams. This proposal will be submitted to the KHL Board of Directors for approval.

Alexei Morozov, KHL president: 

“I’m sure that the league has taken a fair and balanced decision in this difficult situation. This was the only choice that respects our sporting principles. For the first time in history, the KHL season had to be interrupted and ultimately curtailed. That was a tough, but essential decision, dictated by the need to protect the health of the nation.

“Despite the early end to the season, we needed to sum up the results. All eight teams that made it to the second round of the playoffs continued to compete as equals and had an equal chance of progressing to win the Gagarin Cup. That is why we decided to assign a single position of 1-8 to all of these teams, listing them in alphabetical order.”