New arena, new records, old president

SKA opened its new home with a big win and an attendance record, Reid Boucher and Nikolai Goldobin set scoring records, and KHL president Alexei Morozov was re-elected for another term.

SKA opens new home in style

The world’s biggest hockey arena staged its first KHL game on Sunday, with SKA facing HC Sochi in front of 21,481 spectators at the SKA Arena. The new building, which hosted its first action in December at the All-Star Game, immediately set an attendance record for an indoor game in the KHL (the highest outdoor attendance was also in Petersburg, at the city’s World Cup soccer stadium). Most of that crowd went home happy after SKA powered to an 8-1 win.

SKA storms to victory in new arena. February 11 round-up

Boucher becomes best ever import

Reid Boucher’s hat-trick for Avangard against SKA paced a crazy 9-5 win for the Hawks. But it also saw Boucher himself tick some significant boxes. First, he moved to 73 points and set a record for the most productive season by a KHL import. Previous record holder Jan Marek set his total back in 2008-2009. In addition, Boucher moved to 42 goals for the current regular season, a total bettered only by Sergei Mozyakin on 48. Indeed, Boucher is only the third player to net 40 times: Dmitrij Jaskin had 40 goals last season. Since that barn-burner against SKA, Boucher has scored two more and remains on course to improve Mozyakin’s record by the end of the season.

14-goal thriller in Omsk. February 6 round-up

Goldobin overhauls Spartak legend

Nikolai Goldobin’s first season at Spartak is still on-going, but the forward has already written himself into Red-and-White history. After setting a new club scoring record for the KHL era, he went on to raise the bar for Russian championship play. Last week, thanks to two points against Barys, he moved to 72 (35+37) points for the season and took over top spot for all Spartak seasons, including the Soviet championship. Goldobin took the record from Alexander Kozhevnikov, who had 71 points in 1981/82. Kozhevnikov went on to win Olympic gold and was later among the first wave of players to take his talents abroad – playing in Sweden and, briefly, England.

Morozov re-elected

KHL President Alexei Morozov was unanimously re-elected for a second four-year term. Morozov took charge in 2020 and almost immediately had to steer the league through the problems posed by the pandemic. Since then, he has seen the schedule increase to 68 games in the regular season – the longest ever – while navigating the unique challenges of the current geo-political climate. 

Alexei Morozov re-elected as KHL President

“I’d like to thank everyone who supports us and believes in the KHL team,” Morozov said after his re-election was confirmed. “We have a lot of work to do together for the good of our beloved sport. I, and all my colleagues on the KHL team, will do all we can to ensure that interest in hockey only grows, and the champions are crowned in a fair sporting contest on the ice.”

Isayev matches Gelashvili’s record

Lokomotiv goalie Daniil Isayev recorded his 29^th victory of the season in his team’s 3-2 success over Sibir. That equals the club record for a goalie in a KHL regular season campaign, matching the mark set by Georgy Gelashvili back in 2009-2010. It was the first KHL season, and ended with Lokomotiv reaching its first and, so far, only Gagarin Cup final.

Josephs tops Lada’s scoring charts

Lada’s forward Troy Josephs is enjoying a successive first season in the KHL. The Canadian scored his 20^th goal this week, setting a club record for regular-season snipes. Josephs, 29, takes the record from Nikita Filatov, who had 19 goals in 2016-2017.

Skachkov strikes ... for Romania

After 10 seasons in the KHL, forward Evgeny Skachkov had 182 points from 403 regular season games for Traktor, Ak Bars, SKA, Torpedo, Salavat Yulaev, Sochi and Ugra. But that wasn’t the end of the story. He later moved to play in Romania and is still suiting up for Csikszereda at the age of 39. He’s also gained Romanian citizenship and plays for the national team. This weekend he joined the team in Olympic qualification, scoring three goals in a group that also featured Great Britain, China and Serbia. Although Romania could not progress to the next stage, losing 4-7 to GB in the decisive game, Skachkov is optimistic for the future of hockey in his adopted nation. 

“We’ve changed our management, we have new guys on the team,” he said. “Everyone has the right attitude. I think it’s a new level for Romanian hockey. We’ll do whatever we can to help each other, to give more confidence to the new guys.”