2020-2021 Metallurg review. Top-3 in the East and inconsistency in the play
KHL.ru keeps on reviewing the 2020-2021 campaign for the league’s 23 teams. Metallurg returned to the top-3 in the Eastern Conference, but the franchise only reached the second round in the playoffs.
In the 2020 offseason, Magnitka had a colossal job on the transfer market, signing back from North America Nikolai Prokhorkin, Andrei Chibisov, and Igor Shvyryov, and inking Taylor Beck, Mikhail Pashnin, Maxim Karpov, Sergei Plotnikov, and Artyom Zemchyonok. These moves were a reaction to the 2019-2020 lousy showing, with just the seventh place in the Eastern Conference (an all-time low for Magnitogorsk) and a first-round exit in five games against Barys.
The strong transfer market campaign had its effect, with Metallurg returning to the top three teams in the East and showing consistency throughout the season. Due to the pandemic, the team was forced to play with a junior players-filled roster but had accumulated no more than three losses in a row. Moreover, at its peak, Magnitka had a ten-game winning series between January and February, defeating teams like Salavat Yulaev, Jokerit, Lokomotiv, Avtomobilist, and Ak Bars.
In the playoffs, Ilya Vorobyov’s men faced Barys and took their revenge in six games. In the next round, Metallurg had a sensational 5-2 away win in game one and also had another surprisingly large victory (7-1), but a 2-4 in the series sent them to vacations early.
Best players
68 games, 53 (20+33) points
The Canadian forward moved from Avangard to Metallurg and had a breakout season, becoming the team’s top sniper and scorer, and scoring more than half of his goals (13) with the man advantage. Beck posted three doubles in the season against HC Sochi, Dinamo Minsk, and Jokerit. In the playoff’s first round, Beck was valuable for Magnitka, producing 5 (2+3) points in six games. In the second round, however, he had a couple of excellent performances in Metallurg’s wins but was close to invisible when the team lost.
70 games, 52 (16+36) points
Plotnikov had one of his best seasons with Magnitka; only once did he surpass the 50-point mark. Moreover, he was second for Magnitogorsk with a plus-15 rating. The coaches trusted him with more than twenty minutes a night, and Plotnikov replied with an excellent season. In his 31, Plotnikov remains an elite forward at the KHL level. In the playoffs, the forward continued with his strong performance. He posted a hat-trick of assists in the opening game against Barys, then had a goal and a helper in game six, and potted a double in the home win over Avangard.
37 games, 20 W, GAA 1.95, 93.3%, 2 SO
Olkinuora joined Magnitka from Admiral to backup Vasily Koshechkin, but in the end, he played more than the veteran Russian netminder. In the regular season, the Finn goalie was second in the league for saves percentage (93.5%) and made it to the top-five for goals-against average (1.90). In the playoffs, Olkinuora played five of six games against Barys and two against Avangard.
Best game
In the fourth game of the series against Avangard, Magnitka gifted its fans a memorable 7-1 victory. After goals by Grigory Dronov and Beck, Hawks’ forward Klim Kostin cut the hosts’ lead short. Metallurg dominated the rest of the game: Plotnikov and Dennis Rasmussen enlarged the gap with the man advantage, and in the third period, Plotnikov scored again, followed by Danila Yurov at his first KHL playoff goal. Philip Holm scored the 7-1 shorthanded tally to end the game.
Head coach
Ilya Vorobyov, as many other coaches, was faced with the coronavirus challenge but managed to go through it, and the team ended the regular season as the Eastern Conference’s third seed. The team’s top-four scoring players were acquired in the offseason, and this speaks aloud about Vorobyov’s ability to get his players well-versed in the team’s system. However, unfortunately for Magnitka’s fans, in the series against Avangard, the team’s special units didn’t play their best, and the leaders could perform better.
“Our third place in the regular season isn’t a bad result, especially considering that we had 16 players out at a time. In the playoffs, we defeated Barys; then we lost to a better opponent. We analyzed the games and understood where we failed. When we could score first, Avangard couldn’t fight back. But when we allowed the first tally, the Hawks clogged things up, and we couldn’t solve the puzzle. If we wouldn’t lose game two in OT after an unneeded penalty, the outcome of the series could be much different,” Vorobyov said after the season.
Offseason moves
Metallurg is very active on the transfer market this season as well. They traded Brendan Leipsic and Nikita Korostelyov off CSKA and signed defensemen Linus Hultstrom, Alexei Volgin, and Alexei Maklyukov. Magnitogorsk also inked forwards Anatoly Nikontsev and Pavel Akolzin, as well as Josh Currie and Philippe Maillet from the AHL.
Koshechkin will also spend a further year with Metallurg. However, Plotnikov and Beck left the team, as well as Holm, Rasmussen, Nikolay Kulemin, and Andrej Nestrasil.
