U23s and RUS Stars advance to All-Star Final

The opening day of the All-Star Weekend in Yekaterinburg was as action-packed as ever. In the four-team tournament, the KHL U23 Stars beat KHL World Stars, then KHL RUS Stars outshot home favorites KHL Ural Stars to join them in Sunday’s final. The Ural team picked up a point in the Skill Show thanks to Alexei Vasilevsky’s folk-inspired attempt, with Sam Anas and German Tochilkin also winning their events.

Korotky treble puts youngsters on top

KHL U23 Stars 8 KHL World Stars 5 (3-2, 5-3)

A hat-trick from SKA’s Matvei Korotky paced a victory for the league’s rising stars, with JHL prospects Artyom Bondar and Maxim Filimonov also making handy contributions in an entertaining game.

The World Stars, comprised of the league’s foreign legion, got the opening goal with Avtomobilist forward Daniel Sprong finding the net on home ice. In keeping with the general theme that these days everything is made in China, the two assists came from Shanghai Dragons players.

Bondar tied it up for the youngsters before Avangard’s Andrew Poturalski restored the imports’ lead. However, Yegor Vinogradov (Torpedo) made it 2-2 before Korotky’s first of the day gave the U23s an intermission lead.

After the break, Vinogradov struck again to make it 4-2, and the World Stars never recovered that two-goal deficit. In the closing stages both teams pulled their netminders for an action packed finish that brought four goals in the last minute and saw Korotky complete his hat-trick amid some crazy scenes at both ends of the ice.

Okulov, Belozyorov lead RUS Stars into final

KHL Ural Stars 3 KHL RUS Stars 6 (1-3, 2-3)

The Russian line-up secured its place in the final, dousing home hopes. The new format for this year’s competition – with ‘select’ teams replacing the familiar divisional line-ups – meant there was plenty for Yekaterinburg-based fans to root for in a Ural roster uniting the best from Avtomobilist, Salavat Yulaev, Traktor and Metallurg.

But that renowned hockey region proved no match for the rest of Russia on this occasion, falling to a 3-6 loss and moving on to a third-place playoff against KHL World Stars tomorrow.

After a cautious start, things livened up when Konstantin Okulov (Avangard) and Vadim Shipachyov (Dinamo Minsk) put the “visitors” up by two. Alexei Vasilevsky (Salavat Yulaev), fresh from winning the Skill Show’s shoot-out contest, pulled one back for the Urals, but Yegor Alanov (Sibir) added a third before the intermission to keep the RUS stars on top.

At the start of the second period, hometown hero Jesse Blacker pulled one back, then Magnitogorsk’s prolific trio of Tkachyov, Kantserov and Dmitry Silantyev tied the game. The Urals looked to be on the way to a fightback win, but it wasn’t to be. Instead, the RUS Stars got the next three goals – two from Andrei Belozyorov and a second of the game from Okulov, both of whom finished with three points apiece to lead their team to victory.

Skill show: Gaming, folklore, speed and power

The first event was the shoot-out challenge. As always, this had more to do with imagination than scoring power. And, as always, we saw some memorable moments from the competing players.

Dinamo Minsk forward Vadim Moroz was up first. He invited clubmate Vadim Shipachyov to join him, with the KHL’s record goalscorer using a gaming pad to “program” his friend’s effort. But the winning attempt, with 22% of votes, was a Bashkir-themed shot from Salavat Yulaev’s Alexei Vasilevsky (Ural Stars). He donned traditional costume and used a Bashkir folk instrument to drive the goalie from his net before scoring unopposed.

The next event was the fastest lap speed skating event. This was won by German Tochilkin (Neftekhimik, U23 Stars) in a time of 13.733 seconds.

Then came the captain’s challenge, six events contested by four team captains Prokhor Poltapov, Alexander Radulov, Sam Anas and Yegor Yakovlev. The quartet faced tests of shooting and passing accuracy, played billiards and basketball on ice and finally had a free shot from the blue line into a miniature net. Dinamo Minsk’s Anas won this one for KHL World Stars.