Season preview. Torpedo: Kruchinin and Sizov return, Isakov takes on new challenge
KHL.ru continues its club-by-club preview of the 2025/2026 season with Torpedo. There’s a new head coach in Nizhny Novgorod, preparing for his first campaign in the KHL.
Last season
In 2024/2025 Torpedo started strongly but then struggled for consistency: good games against the top clubs were often followed by losses to teams outside the playoff zone. That disbalance prevented the team from competing for higher positions and it ended the season in eighth place in the West.
That set up a first-round playoff meeting with champion-elect Lokomotiv and the series was not a close contest. Lokomotiv’s pragmatic hockey was too strong for Torpedo’s cavalier attacking play. A 0-4 loss in the series spelled the end for Igor Larionov as head coach, and he left the club after three seasons.
Recruitment
Arrivals:
Goalies: Lorens Zinaddin (Izhstal, VHL), Denis Kostin (Sibir). Defenseman: Sergei Boykov (Avangard), Robert Nardella (Rapperswill, SUI), Mikhail Naumenkov (Salavat Yulaev), Yegor Nikitin (Dynamo Moscow), Anton Sizov (Dynamo Moscow), Ilya Sushko (Dinamo Minsk), Alexander Shchemerov (Amur). Forwards: Anton Kosolapov (Ryazan VDV, VHL), Alexei Kruchinin (Severstal), Nikolai Mayorov (Metallurg), Nikita Rozhkov (CSKA), Yegor Sokolov (Tucson, AHL), Dmitry Shevchenko (Amur).
Departures:
Goalies: Ivan Bocharov (Lada), Alexander Sharychenkov. Defensemen: Daniil Bokun (Severstal), Dmitry Breus (Barys, loan), Slava Voynov (Avangard), Kirill Kirsanov (Los Angeles, NHL), Mikhail Orlov (Sochi), Keaton Thompson (Wolfsburg, GER), Markus Phillips (SKA); Forwards: Daniil Ilyin, Dmitry Kagarlitsky, Vladislav Kodola (Metallurg Novokuznetsk, VHL), Igor Larionov Jr (SKA), Bobby Lynch (Wolfsburg, GER), Denis Orlovich-Grudkov, Evgeny Svechnikov (Amur).
Top 3 signings
Denis Kostin
In terms of personal statistics and team results, 2024/2025 was the best season of Kostin’s KHL career. He was Sibir’s first-choice goalie and backstopped the team to the playoffs. In post season, despite an awful start to the series against Salavat Yulaev, Sibir hit back to take the contest to seven games. Denis also got his first KHL All-Star call-up. So it was surprising that Sibir’s management could not agree a new contract with him, and Torpedo moved fast to secure one of the best goalies on the market this summer.
Mikhail Naumenkov
The 32-year-old defenseman swapped Ufa for Nizhny Novgorod. It’s likely that Naumenkov will have a bigger role at Torpedo, including a spot on the power play. His experience also plays a part: in Nizhny Novgorod it’s easy to imagine him as a father figure in the locker room, especially given the youth of Torpedo’s leading D-men Anton Silayev and Bogdan Konyushkov.
Alexei Kruchinin
This is one of the players who became a headliner for Torpedo’s combination-based attacking hockey in 2022/2023, right after Igor Larionov’s arrival behind the bench. That regular season was Kruchinin’s best in the KHL 52 (15+37) points in 60 games: he never had more than 25 points before or since. However, that was followed by a slump and a year away at Severstal with Larionov’s former assistant Andrei Kozyrev. Now he’s back in Nizhny Novgorod, ready to resume his role as one of Torpedo’s most creative players.
Coaching
Igor Larionov’s departure was unlikely to be exclusively due to that first round sweep from Lokomotiv. Over three years of the Professor at Torpedo, that trademark attacking hockey lost its edge and the best result (progress to the second round) came in the first campaign.
His replacement is Alexei Isakov, a man promoted from within. In 2024/2025 he led Torpedo-Gorky (Torpedo’s farm club) to victory in the VHL. Moreover, Isakov has JHL bronze as head coach, plus bronze and silver medals from the VHL. Clearly, hiring a head coach with no KHL experience is a risk. However, the examples of Larionov and Kozyrev show that it can pay off. After all, given his success within the club, Isakov clearly deserves a chance to show what he can do at the highest level.
Goaltending
The goalie situation here is very interesting. There’s Ivan Kulbakov, who was first choice last season. Denis Kostin has arrived, and the management would hardly see him as a back-up for Kulbakov. So it will be fascinating to see how the coaching staff splits game time between the two this season. The third goalie is likely to be Lorens Zinaddin, signed from Izhstal: this goalie is well-known in the club’s system.
Defense
Looking at the defensive arrivals gives the impression that Torpedo is keen to bring experience to the back line. We spoke above about Naumenkov, previously a leader at top KHL clubs. Anton Sizov returns to the club, Robert Nardella joins from Switzerland and there are more new blue-liners in Alexander Shchemerov, Sergei Boykov and Ilya Sushko. On paper, including the likes of Konyushkov, Silayev, Varlakov and other promising youngsters, Torpedo’s defense looks good – but will it work on the ice?
As for departures, the likes of Slava Voynov, Keaton Thompson, Markus Phillips, Daniil Bokun, Kirill Kirsanov and Mikhail Orlov all left. None of these players could really be regarded as key figures last season so their absence seems unlikely to undermine the defense this term.
Forwards
Offensive arrivals have been a bit less impressive. Of six new forwards only three, Kruchinin, Nikita Rozhkov and Dmitry Shevchenko have been KHL regulars in recent seasons. And even Rozhkov, who did well for Severstal in 2023/2024, spent last season at Zvezda, CSKA’s farm-club in the VHL. Maybe the club concluded that it didn’t need to add much to the forward line, given that four of last season’s top scorers remain in Nizhny Novgorod.
Of those five, only Dmitry Kagarlitsky left the team, along with Bobby Lynch, Igor Larionov Jr and Evgeny Svechnikov. But it would be hard to call the other three key figures on the Torpedo offense.
Prospects
Year on year, Torpedo has demonstrated its ability to develop young prospects. Right now there’s an abundance of young talent in Nizhny Novgorod that is already KHL ready. On defense, this includes Silayev and Arseny Varlakov. On offense there’s Nikita Artamonov, Vasily Atanasov and Yegor Vinogradov. These can already be regarded as key players, despite their age.
As for the next group waiting for its chance, the stand-outs include defenseman Alexander Pelevin and forwards Artyom Misnikov, Andrei Krutov, Kirill Svishchyov and Daniil Omelyusik. In some form, each of these linked up with the first team under Larionov and may now enjoy more opportunities to prove themselves in the KHL under Isakov given that the new head coach is closely tied to the club’s system.
What to expect this season
It’s clear that the big issue for Torpedo this season will be how quickly the new head coach is able to adapt to this level. If it’s a quick and painless process, then the team is well capable of securing its playoff spot early and finishing higher than seventh or eighth in the conference. But if Isakov makes a slow start, given the improvements among Torpedo’s rivals, this could turn into a battle to the end for a top-eight finish.
