Eastern Playoffs open with road wins
The first action of the 2025 Gagarin Cup playoffs bucked the seedings. Defending champion Metallurg lost 4-1 at home to sixth seed Avangard, while Ak Bars won on the road at fourth seed Avtomobilist by the same scoreline.
Hawks make flying start
Metallurg Magnitogorsk 1 Avangard Omsk 4 (0-2, 0-1, 1-1)
(Avangard leads the series 1-0)
The seedings for this series would make defending champion Metallurg the clear favorite. Yet regular season rankings of third vs sixth do not tell the full story. Avangard has been in fantastic form throughout 2025, with the appointment of Guy Boucher as head coach seeming to fix the problems that plagued the team under Sergei Zvyagin at the start of the season.
After ushering in the new year with a 5-1 win at Neftekhimik, the Hawks suffered just six losses in the remaining regular season action. The fact that such a strong run was only good enough for sixth place in the East speaks to the weakness of the team’s start and the ground that had to be made up to secure a playoff spot in the first place.
But now Avangard is here, and it wasted little time in making its presence felt.
A year ago, Metallurg’s march to the Gagarin Cup owed much to the emergence of Ilya Nabokov as a top goaltending prospect. Since then the 21-year-old has continued to play well, confirming his status as Magnitogorsk’s #1. But this year’s playoffs could hardly have got off to a worse start for him. In the third minute he was surprised by Nikolai Prokhorkin’s shot as the visitor took the lead with its first effort of the game. Then, after five minutes, it was 2-0. Nabokov faced a fusillade of shots before Konstantin Okulov eventually found a way through.
The home team’s day didn’t improve much. Midway through the first period a fluffed change led to a too many men penalty. The Avangard power play could not extend its lead, but it added to the sense that Metallurg was not quite on its game. The intermission came with the visitor looking surprisingly comfortable.
It wasn’t until the second period that we saw some genuine offensive threat from the home team. As the game got beyond the halfway stage, Valery Orekhov got into space in a central position and fired a shot that evaded Nikita Serebryakov but bobbled past the post. Then Nikita Kamalov’s shot dropped behind the visiting goalie, but he reacted in time to freeze the puck on the goal line.
The subsequent pushing and shoving saw Avangard on the power play. Prokhorkin set up Ryan Spooner for a shot that went narrowly wide and the visitor rode its momentum even after Magnitka got back to full strength. Prokhorkin was involved again, rounding the net to set up Semyon Chistyakov, wide open on the slot, for 3-0.
That left Metallurg looking for a fast start to the third. With Nail Yakupov in the box, the home team got it. It took just three seconds to execute a textbook play: Luke Johnson won the faceoff, Kantserov moved the puck to Daniil Vovchenko and his shot deflected off Chistyakov and beat Serebryakov.
Sadly, it was less of a lifeline for the home team and more of a last gesture of defiance. The teams traded scoring chances, but Avangard always had the edge. In the closing stages, Prokhorkin twice went to the box but Metallurg could not take advantage. Indeed, the second home power play saw Nabokov go to the bench, only for Damir Sharipzyanov to put a short-handed goal into an empty net.
Bilyalov frustrates Avto offense
Avtomobilist Yekaterinburg 1 Ak Bars Kazan 4 (0-1, 0-2, 1-1)
(Ak Bars leads the series 1-0)
Avtomobilist dominated much of this game, outshooting Ak Bars 37-26 and spending more than 10 minutes on the attack against less than five minutes for the visitor. Yet the end result was a 1-4 loss for the home team as clinical finishing and good goaltending gave Ak Bars the edge.
Like today’s other Eastern Conference action, this series promises to be an intriguing contest. Avtomobilist had a slight edge in regular season, finishing just ahead of Ak Bars in the standings. But Ak Bars is the team with far greater playoff pedigree; notwithstanding last season’s victory over Kazan on the way to the semi-finals, the Motormen had won just one post season series prior to 2024.
That might go some way to explaining how this game went against the seeding as Anvar Gatiyatulin’s men started with a road win. The evening got off to a subdued start in Yekaterinburg as the arena fell silent in memory of Andrei Martemyanov, a much-loved former player and coach at Avtomobilist who passed away earlier this week aged 61.
But the home team looked to lift that mood in the opening exchanges and the first big chance of the game went to Avtomobilist in the fourth minute when Nikita Shashkov set up Artyom Kashtanov. The 20-year-old might have claimed the first playoff goal at the UGMT Arena, but Timur Bilyalov stopped his shot.
Midway through the first period there was a long pause as the officials reviewed an incident that saw Andrei Obidin take a stick to the face. After several minutes, they concluded that Artyom Galimov had done nothing wrong, and play continued at equal strength for a few moments.
Avtomobilist got its power play soon after when Dmitrij Jaskin sat for tripping. However, Ak Bars had the KHL’s best PK in regular season and allowed nothing on the home power play here. The Motormen could not match that. Maxim Osipov’s penalty opened the door for Ak Bars – which had been somewhat second best up to the 16th minute – and Alexei Pustozyorov opened the scoring.
Ten seconds into the middle frame, and a nightmare moment for home goalie Evgeny Alikin helped the visitor double its lead. He went behind his net for a routine clean-up, but the puck bounced over his stick and went to Ilya Safonov. He quickly moved it on for Alexander Barabanov to close in on the goalie and double the lead.
In response, Avto sought a way back and, as in the first period, had arguably the better of the play. However, Bilyalov dealt with everything that came his way and discipline undermined the home team’s efforts. The Motormen managed to kill a three-on-five penalty but fell further behind in the 36th minute when Nikita Lyamkin fired through traffic to make it 3-0.
The home team thought it had a way back in the 44th minute when a three-on-two break saw Stephane da Costa find the top shelf. However, the Ak Bars bench successfully challenged for offside and preserved its three-goal lead.
In the closing stages, Ak Bars found itself reduced to three skaters. Alikin went to the bench and we saw a rare six-on-three passage. It culminated in a goal from Alexander Sharov, denying Bilyalov a shut-out and offering a faint hope of a fightback. But three minutes never looked like enough time to save the game, and Galimov’s empty-net goal ensured there would be no way back for the home team.
