Season preview. Spartak: Parting ways with Goldobin

KHL.ru continues its club-by-club preview of the coming season. Today, it’s Spartak’s turn.

Last season

Spartak had a strong start last season. In September, the Moscow side won seven out of nine games, losing in regulation only once. At one point, the Red-and-Whites even topped the standings. By winter, results dipped somewhat, but Spartak remained a stable team. In the end, the red-and-whites finished third in the Western Conference and became one of the most productive teams of the regular season, scoring 221 goals.

In the playoffs, Spartak, just like the year before, took care of Severstal (4–1), but in the second round lost to an Eastern Conference team. Spartak was up 3–1 in the series against Salavat Yulaev, but the Ufa team showed incredible character and managed to turn the series in their favor.

Recruitment

Arrivals:
Goalie: Evgeny Volokhin (HC Sochi, trade). Defenseman: Joseph Keane (San Jose, AHL). Forwards: Nikita Buruyanov (Dynamo Moscow, trade), Nikita Kholodilin (Avangard, trade), Nikita Korostelyov (Traktor), Danil Kochurov (Salavat Yulaev, trade), Grigory Kuzmin (SKA, trade), Lucas Lockhart (Kunlun Red Star), Nikita Susuyev (Admiral, return from loan), Nathan Todd (Salavat Yulaev), Ivan Vorobyov (Vityaz, trade), Stanislav Yarovoy (Vityaz, trade).

Retained:
Goalies: Artyom Zagidulin, Dmitry Nikolayev. Defensemen: Roman Bychkov, Dmitry Vishnevsky, Daniil Ivanov, Veniamin Korolyov, Dmitry Kostenko, Andrei Mironov, Daniil Orlov, Yegor Savikov, Nikita Sokolov, Nikita Yefremov, Yegor Zaitsev. Forwards: Alexander Belyaev, Yegor Filin, Sergei Lukyantsev, Mikhail Maltsev, Demid Mansurov, Ivan Morozov, Georgy Ovchinnikov, Alexander Pashin, Danil Pivchulin, Pavel Poryadin, German Rubtsov, Adam Ruzicka, Daniil Usmanov.

Departures:
Goalie: Dmitry Kulikov (Dynamo Moscow, trade). Defensemen: Michal Cajkovsky, Alexei Yegorov (Avangard, trade). Forwards: Andrei Chibisov, Ansel Galimov, Nikolai Goldobin (SKA), Prokhor Korbit (Salavat Yulaev, trade), Andrei Loktionov (SKA).

Top 3 signings

Nathan Todd

Last season was Todd’s first in the KHL. The Canadian immediately became a leader for Salavat Yulaev, putting up 52 (14+38) points in the regular season, and then added another 5 (2+3) points in four playoff games. And if not for injuries, Todd’s Gagarin Cup tally would likely have been much higher. A right-handed center especially valuable as a playmaker, Todd is a major asset for any team.

Nikita Korostelyov

Korostelyov is a productive forward with a flair for bright improvisation. Judging by his character, he seems like a perfect fit for Alexei Zhamnov’s Spartak. At Traktor, where he was traded from Severstal last season, Korostelyov didn’t become a key player, but still posted a decent stat line — 7+8 in 37 games. With Severstal and Metallurg, Korostelyov scored far more points — in total, the scoring forward has 154 (94+60) points in 316 KHL games.

Lucas Lockhart

Last season was the best in the KHL for Lucas Lockhart — the leader of the Chinese KHL franchise in games played (446) and the second all-time scorer in team history (143 points) — he notched 33 (16+17) points in 67 games. Lockhart is a versatile center who can play both at even strength and on special teams.

Coaching

The upcoming season will be the third for Alexei Zhamnov as Spartak’s head coach. Zhamnov can already be considered one of the most successful coaches in the club’s KHL history. He twice led the Red-and-Whites to the second round of the playoffs, something Spartak hadn’t achieved since 2010. Over two seasons, Zhamnov also climbed to the top of Spartak’s all-time list of winningest coaches in the KHL (92), overtaking the club’s legend Milos Riha.

Goalies

Artyom Zagidulin and Dmitry Nikolayev will be joined this season by Evgeny Volokhin. The 20-year-old goalie will likely start as Spartak’s third option in net, but he already made his KHL debut with Sochi (4 wins in 28 games, 90.1% SV, 3.48 GAA) and will surely try to challenge the more experienced goalies.

Defense

On defense, Spartak made just one change. Michal Cajkovsky, whose past season can hardly be called anything but “patchy,” was replaced by Joseph Keane. The 26-year-old American already played for Spartak in the 2022-2023 and 2023-2024 seasons, though his performances in red and white left mixed impressions. Keane scored 6+18 in his first season and 4+7 in his second, but his plus-minus numbers weren’t great. He posted a minus-13 rating in his KHL debut season and a seemingly decent plus-2 the following year, but finished that campaign after just two playoff games against Metallurg, where he posted a minus-4. Last season Keane played in the AHL with the San Jose Barracuda, where he recorded 11 points (2+9) and a minus-8 in 40 games.

Forwards

The biggest news from Spartak this summer was parting ways with Nikolai Goldobin. Over two seasons, the forward became one of the brightest players on the team, appearing in 152 games for the Moscow club and collecting 154 (64+90) points. Yes, his second season wasn’t as smooth — Zhamnov even scratched him for a couple of games — but it’s hard to deny that Goldobin left a significant mark in Spartak’s recent history.

At the same time, other core offensive players remain with the team — Ivan Morozov, Pavel Poryadin, Mikhail Maltsev, Alexander Pashin, and even Adam Ruzicka, with whom negotiations dragged on but eventually resulted in the Slovak staying at Spartak. The newcomers up front are also solid, and there are young players from whom progress can be expected. In short, even after losing a player of Goldobin’s caliber, Spartak’s attack should not suffer in quality.

Prospects

Alexei Zhamnov has a rich pool to choose from — there are plenty of young players in Spartak’s system. Some of them we’ve already seen in the KHL on a regular basis. For example, defensemen 21-year-old Daniil Orlov (7+12 and plus-20 in 64 games) and 22-year-old Veniamin Korolyov (2+3 and plus-2 in 64 games, second on the team in hits).

In attack, Spartak’s main young star right now can be called Sergei Lukyantsev. The forward, who last season played more than 100 games across the KHL, VHL, and JHL, made a bright debut at the elite level — 1+4 in 15 regular season games and another three goals in the playoffs.
This summer, Maxim Filimonov joined Spartak from Atlant’s junior team. Interestingly, the second-leading scorer of the 2024/2025 MHL season, along with Lukyantsev, took part in the 2025 Fonbet KHL All-Star Game — Lukyantsev and Filimonov were invited as the top players of the JHL Challenge Cup.

And let’s not forget that MHK Spartak won the Kharlamov Cup last season — surely we’ll see some of those championship juniors make their way into the main roster.

What to expect

There’s no doubt that under Alexei Zhamnov, Spartak will continue to play exciting, attacking hockey. That should be enough to once again put themselves in a strong starting position heading into the playoffs, and in the Gagarin Cup race, it’s time for the Red-and-Whites to take the next step. The elimination at the hands of Salavat Yulaev in 2025 was an unpleasant but valuable experience for Spartak — one that should help the team going forward.