Hawks fly into semi-final

A narrow 2-1 win over CSKA was enough for Avangard to complete a 4-1 series win. After defeating last season’s Gagarin Cup winning head coach, the Hawks advance to face the defending champion under former Avangard boss Bob Hartley.

First-period goals make the difference

Avangard Omsk 2 CSKA Moscow 1 (2-0, 0-0, 0-1)
Avangard wins the series 4-1

First-period goals from Giovanni Fiore and Dmitry Rashevsky were enough for Avangard to win this series in five games. CSKA got one back early in the third period, but could not save the game.

The Hawks advance to the Gagarin Cup semi-finals for the first time since 2023. CSKA head coach Igor Nikitin’s hopes of winning back-to-back titles with different clubs – something never achieved in the KHL before – are over.

The home team made a perfect start to the game, opening the scoring after just 35 seconds. Avangard’s first attack of the game was a two-on-one rush with Konstantin Okulov threading a pass beyond the stick of an opponent for Fiore to fire home his third goal of this year’s playoffs.

After giving up that early goal, CSKA went on the offensive. Avangard would be limited to just 81 seconds of attacking possession in the first period, and

Nikita Serebryakov was the busier of the two goalies. However, despite the Muscovites’ efforts, the home defense was able to keep much of the play away from the danger zone and many of the shots came from less than threatening areas of the ice.

At the other end, the Hawks’ counterattacks were more effective. After 12 minutes Mikhail Gulyayev quickly turned defense into attack, Nikolai Prokhorkin’s shot cannoned off the end boards, and Rashevsky was on hand to slide it behind Dmitry Gamzin and into the net for 2-0.

The pattern of play didn’t change much in the second period. CSKA tried to establish itself in the Avangard zone, often moving the puck nicely but struggling to find an end product. The Hawks, in response, defended deep and looked for occasional counter punches. One of those produced the first power play of the game in the 23rd minute. The best chance went to a shorthanded CSKA team when Ivan Drozdov almost got clean through on Serebryakov’s net.

Another home power play came and went with similarly little alarm, but in the latter half of the middle frame Avangard began to move play away from its net. For the first time in the game, Guy Boucher’s men managed extended spells in CSKA territory but found the visiting defense well prepared.

With 21 seconds left on the clock, CSKA got its first power play of the night when Artyom Blazhievsky’s clearance flew over the glass. Although the visitor could not cash in on either side of the intermission, it wasn’t long into the third that Drozdov pulled a goal back. A positional error in the home defense enabled Nikita Nesterov to send the forward away to beat Serebryakov.

With 15 minutes to save the game, CSKA took control of the puck and looked to find a way through the Hawks’ rearguard. But Boucher’s men adopted an ultra-defensive approach, lining up with one-and-four in center ice and looking strangle any danger at birth. It led to long periods of great tension, but little opportunity for goals – a situation that suited a team defending a narrow lead.

With two-and-a-half minutes to play, Nikitin called a time-out and set up a final surge for his team. The closing stages were slow paced: Avangard frequently iced the puck and the play was disjointed and whistle-heavy. While that made for a frustrating spectacle, it made it difficult for CSKA to create a chance to save the game or the series and the home team ran down the clock to clinch a 4-1 victory and progress into the next round.

Thursday’s result confirms the first of this year’s semi-final pairings. Avangard will face defending champion Lokomotiv, with the series starting in Yaroslavl on April 24.