Ilya Vorobyov: following his father’s steps
KHL.ru continues honoring the careers of those who became league’s legends. Today, the talk is about Ilya Vorobyov, a Gagarin Cup champion and two-time finalist as a coach.
From an abroad move to multiple concussions
Hardly anyone was surprised when Ilya Vorobyov, after ending his hockey player career, became a head coach. When presented with the example of a father and having dedicated a significant portion of one's life to the game, opting for a different path becomes challenging. Especially when Vorobyov’s father was not just an average specialist. He spent nearly 40 years in total as a coach, including leading teams in which Ilya played himself. He had the background of Viktor Tikhonov and Vladimir Yurzinov’s school, won medals of all levels in the country’s championship, and worked with the Russian national team, including the historic 1998 Olympics, the first with NHL players.
Looking at Vorobyov during his playing career, it seemed that becoming a head coach was almost a perfect fit for him. Reliable, versatile, fearless, capable of standing up for himself, a systematic player of good level. It’s often from such players that good coaches emerge. For instance, Igor Nikitin. Or, indeed, Petr Ilyich Vorobyov – what a great example. Even Dave King, who has garnered many enemies due to his writings, praised Ilya in his book.
“His father, Pyotr Vorobyov, is a great coach, so I’m not surprised that his son has become an excellent coach. It’s in the genes. He could very well become the next head coach of the Russian national team. Ilya always had the ambition to study the game. When he played on my team, I told him that one day he would make a good coach. Ilya always asked questions and was interested in everything,” King said in an interview in 2017.
Vorobyov ended his playing career quite early, at the age of 34. In his last two seasons, he hardly played due to concussions, which forced the forward hang up his skates. The situation was more than serious. In an interview he said that he “couldn’t even engage in sports or move normally. I walked 50 meters and had to stop. But, thank God, that’s all passed,” Vorobyov said in 2016. Nevertheless, he played nearly fifteen seasons at a high level. He learned English and German languages. Thanks to this, Vorobyov was able to start working as a coach.
The last years of Vorobyov’s career were spent in the German DEL. His father worked in Frankfurt for three years in the early to mid-1990s. Since then, Ilya has lived in that country, obtained citizenship, and his children were born there. While he played in Russia for four seasons, his family remained in Germany. Naturally, after finishing his Super League performances, Vorobyov returned there.
The 2009-2010 championship became Vorobyov’s last season (though in that championship, the forward only played two matches). And the 2010 IIHF World Championship took place in Germany, in Cologne. That’s when Vorobyov took his first step into his coaching career.
From interpreter to head coach
For each national team at every IIHF World Championship, a coordinator is assigned – a person who knows the language of the country hosting the global event and the language spoken by the team under their charge. This is necessary primarily to address various practical issues. During the tournament in Germany, Ilya Vorobyov became this assistant for Team Russia and its head coach Vyacheslav Bykov. In the 2010 IIHF World Championship, the Russians secured the second place following a defeat in the finals to Team Czechia. At that moment, there were eight years left until Vorobyov would lead the national team.
When Vorobyov returned to Team Russia, it was no longer in a temporary role; he was enlisted as an assistant to Oleg Znarok in September 2014. At that time, the specialist was yet to have any experience in autonomous work, but many already saw his potential behind the bench. In 2015, just as five years earlier, Vorobyov experienced the bitter emotions of the team’s defeat in the final. On the other hand, a silver medal at the IIHF World Championship level can’t be considered a poor result. Vorobyov went through the Olympic cycle with Znarok almost entirely. In 2016 and 2017, the team won bronze medals at the IIHF World Championship. And in 2018, they celebrated a coveted win at the main tournament of the four-year cycle – the Olympic Games.
Who could have thought that shortly after the triumph in Pyeongchang, Znarok would leave the national team, and Vorobyov would become the acting head coach.
“Znarok has done a lot for us – winning gold medal at both the Olympics and the World Championship. Now he’s a bit exhausted; there has been a strong psychological burden on him in both SKA and the national team. Therefore, the Russian Ice Hockey Federation appointed Ilya Vorobyov as the acting head coach for the upcoming IIHF World Championship in Denmark,” the RIHF president Vladislav Tretyak explained. “I didn’t expect this,” Vorobyov himself noted.
For Vorobyov, the first attempt didn’t go smoothly. The team that had won medals in the four previous World Championships and had secured medals in nine out of eleven WC couldn’t get any new hardware in Denmark, losing to Canada in OT at the quarterfinals stage (4:5). Nevertheless, shortly after the tournament ended, the Russian Ice Hockey Federation announced that Vorobyov was confirmed as Team Russia’s head coach.
The following year in Slovakia, the team seemed to have made progress as they secured a bronze medal. However, that tournament marked Vorobyov’s last at the helm of the national team. The explanation was evident – Russia had assembled a very powerful roster, including practically all the stars of Russian hockey – Andrei Vasilevsky, Mikhail Sergachev, Dmitry Orlov, Alexander Ovechkin, Evgeny Malkin, Nikita Kucherov, Ilya Kovalchuk, Evgeny Kuznetsov, Kirill Kaprizov, and others. Yet, in the semifinals, the team lost 0:1 to Finland, despite the opponent’s roster lacking any NHL regulars. Nevertheless, this didn’t stop the Finns from eventually becoming world champions.
In one way or another, Vorobyov does possess a World Championship medal. Such a result is not something every specialist can boast of.
From MHL assistant to Gagarin Cup winner
Vorobyov began his coaching career at the club level in 2010 in the fourth division of the German championship. However, in the following season, he found himself in Russia as the coach of the youth team of Lokomotiv Yaroslavl under the leadership of his father. Shortly after the plane crash that tragically claimed the lives of the club's entire main team, father and son took over the reins of Lokomotiv, which was resurrected during the season to compete in the Higher League.
In the next season, Vorobyov was invited to join Metallurg. At that time, Metallurg’s boards decided to bring in a coach from North America who required both an assistant and a translator. Thus, even before finalizing an agreement with Paul Maurice, the club signed a contract with Vorobyov.
03.05.2012 Appointed as Metallurg’s assistant coach.
30.04.2014 First Gagarin Cup’s win as an assistant coach.
17.10.2015 Appointed as Metallurg’s head coach.
19.04.2016 Gagarin Cup win
That season, Paul Maurice led Florida to the Stanley Cup final. However, in 2013, he was unable to progress past the first round in his first – and so far, only – KHL season and didn’t return to the team. Nevertheless, there were personal reasons for this. Metallurg’s boards didn’t really question Maurice, especially since during that season, the team’s main offensive force – Sergei Gonchar, Evgeny Malkin, and Nikolai Kulemin – had left the team once the NHL lockout was over. The team was used to relying on their results. After the famed players returned to the NHL, no one could fully take on the leadership burden.
The next season, Mike Keenan replaced Maurice in Magnitogorsk. The renowned coach, who had won both the Stanley Cup and the Canada Cup twice, led Metallurg to victory in the championship in his debut season, and he then became the first coach to win both the Gagarin Cup and the Stanley Cup.
In October 2014, Metallurg extended the contracts of Keenan and his entire staff until April 30, 2016. A few days later, however, the club’s vice-president, Gennady Velichkin, announced that Vorobyov would become the next head coach of the team. However, Ilya Petrovich’s time came even before the end of the Canadian’s contract – in October 2015, when Keenan was somewhat surprisingly fired.
Vorobyov achieved his best coaching result in his very first season. Before the Gagarin Cup finals started, many considered CSKA as the favorites. The first match confirmed these predictions as the Muscovites grabbed the victory with a 5:1 score. However, the rest of the final showed that Metallurg was winning not just due to Keenan’s strategies, or the backbone of the team built before his arrival – goalkeeper Vasily Koshechkin, defenseman Chris Lee, and the leading troika with Sergei Mozyakin, Jan Kovar, and Danis Zaripov. Magnitka demonstrated a strong combination game and ultimately imposed their style of play on CSKA, a significant credit to the head coach.
In the following season, Metallurg and Vorobyov proved the consistency of their success from 2016. While the team didn’t win the Gagarin Cup, they reached the finals again. A gold and a silver in two years were remarkable achievements that couldn’t be disputed. It was then unmistakably evident – a new top coach had emerged in the KHL. So, it was hardly surprising when Vorobyov took over the Russian national team and SKA just a year later.
25.02.2018 Became an Olympic champion as Oleg Znarok’s assistant coach.
01.06.2018 Appointed as SKA’s head coach.
26.05.2019 Won the bronze medal as Team Russia’s head coach at the IIHF WC.
06.09.2019 Returns to Metallurg.
23.11.2022 Becomes the sixth coach to reach the 300-win milestone in the KHL history.
03.04.2023 Leaves his seat as Magnitka’s head coach.
Vorobyov’s path with Team Russia has already been discussed. After the IIHF World Championship in Slovakia, he departed not only from the national team but also from SKA, which was eliminated in the semifinals, losing to CSKA in seven games. He returned, of course, to Magnitka, which had a first-round exit in the 2019 Gagarin Cup playoffs.
Vorobyov’s second return to Metallurg bore fruit in the third season. The team reached the finals, where it looked very confident and was up in the series against CSKA 3-1. In the fifth game, Magnitka was leading 2:1 on its home ice in the middle of the closing frame. However, the team allowed a really unneeded goal close to the final hooter and lost in OT. That’s when the turning point of the series occurred. The momentum shifted to CSKA, who secured two more victories and won the Gagarin Cup. At the same time, Metallurg earned the kindest words. For their results and their style of play – just like in 2016, the team aimed to act offensively and play a strong combination game.
After the 2022-2023 season, Vorobyov left Metallurg. However, knowing the close relationship between the coach and the club, it wouldn’t be surprising to see one day Vorobyov’s third return to Magnitogorsk.
Dossier
Ilya Petrovich Vorobyov
Born on March 16, 1975, in Riga
Playing career: Dynamo Moscow, 1992–1993, Frankfurt (Germany), 1993–1999, 2007–2010, Krefeld (Germany), 1999–2001, Mannheim (Germany), 2001–2003, Lada, 2003–2005, Metallurg Magnitogorsk, 2005–2007, Khimik, 2007.
Coaching career: Frankfurt Lions - 2010-2011 (assistant), Loko - 2011 (assistant), Lokomotiv - 2011-2012 (assistant), Metallurg Magnitogorsk - 2012-2015 (assistant), Russian national team - 2014-2018 (assistant), Metallurg Magnitogorsk - 2015–2018, Russian national team - 2018-2019, SKA - 2018–2019, Metallurg Magnitogorsk - 2019–2023.
Honors as a player: Silver (2005) and bronze (2004, 2006) medalist in Russian championships, silver medalist in the World Junior Championship with Team Russia (1995).
Honors as a head coach: Gagarin Cup winner (2016), gold (2016) and silver (2017, 2022) medalist in Russian championships, bronze medalist in the IIHF World Championship (2019).
Honors as an assistant coach: Olympic champion (2018), silver (2015) and bronze (2016, 2017) medalist in IIHF World Championships, Gagarin Cup winner (2014), and Russian champion (2014).
