“If you achieve something and stop working, you’re finished.” Matvei Korotky’s success story
It has certainly been a busy offseason for the forward, who had 27 (14+13) points in 43 regular-season games for SKA in his sophomore season. The Krasnoyarsk native had already started his preparation for a long time. “I’ve long practiced in the gym, skating a couple of times a week to stay in shape” he says about the end of the season. “At the end of May I went to Vietnam for a vacation, and in early June I’ve started preparing for the new season.”
As both SKA and SKA-1946 suffered from early exits in the playoffs, Korotky’s season was cut shorter than usual. “It was definitely a strange feeling,” the forward confirms. “The previous two years I was playing in the Kharlamov Cup Final. This year I was eliminated in the first round of the playoffs with both teams. It gave me a lot to think about.”
He is usually hard on himself after losses. “Sometimes I’m my own biggest critic. After SKA was eliminated, it was difficult mentally to go back and play for SKA-1946. I couldn’t adjust right away, and after the season ended, I was pretty down for a couple of days.”
Korotky had a huge step forward this season, moving from five goals to fourteen for SKA, and also increasing his average time on ice and, consequently, his role within the team. “The coaches trusted our young line,” he says about his unit with Matvei Polyakov and Nikita Dishkovsky. “They let us play, they let us make mistakes, and they expected us to correct them instead of being afraid of them. That trust helped the entire team. I’d say trust, skill, and passion were the biggest factors for my progress.”
Perhaps, the organization changed its approach after the coaching change as Igor Larionov was hired at the helm of the team. “The biggest change wasn’t the cost of making mistakes,” Korotky says, “but how they were handled. Everyone understood that mistakes happen, but what mattered was how you responded. Before this season, mistakes felt unacceptable. If you kept making them, you’d end up on the bench.”. There were also other changes. “We started moving the puck a lot more. Everything became pass, move, get open, shoot. The game became faster.”
Korotky improved in different areas in the offseason. “I spent the summer getting stronger so I could be bigger, tougher, and harder to play against. I also worked on my skating, although people still call me slow. I’m not the fastest player, but I’m not slow either. More importantly, my understanding of the KHL game improved. I also changed my preparation—nutrition, warm-ups, getting to bed earlier, sleeping more, and giving my body more rest on game days.”
He wasn’t also scared by crossing paths with veterans. “Honestly, I’ve never looked at anyone as a ‘wow’ player. I’m in this league too, and everyone is the same. You just go out and play. Even someone like Alexander Radulov, who loves talking on the ice—you can talk right back to him.”
In October, Korotky suffered an injury that prevented him from playing his best hockey. “Before the injury I was playing the best hockey of my career,” Korotky recalls. “I was out for three months, and coming back wasn’t easy. After my first seven games back I was minus-eight, and I joked to myself, ‘Maybe it’s time to retire.’ I only started feeling like myself again by the playoffs, but I still wasn’t at my best."
He still remembers his injury. “I went into the corner to battle for the puck and saw Alexander Yelesin coming to hit me. I had no choice but to get into contact. We collided, and because I was skating faster, I went flying. Looking back, if I had stopped and absorbed the hit, maybe nothing would have happened.”
Later in the season, Korotky skated at the 2026 KHL All-Star Game in Yekaterinburg “It helped me reset, and I started playing better afterward. It’s a great event where you can recharge, spend time with other players, and just enjoy being around hockey.”
After the All-Star game, SKA ended the regular season as the fifth seed in the Western Conference, and the St. Petersburg team faced CSKA in the first round. The Muscovites won the series 4-1. “Besides finishing our chances, we lacked a little luck, and we didn’t defend well enough.” The series was pretty physical, with many scrums between the players. “That’s playoff hockey. Some players ignore it, others get involved. If you know how to get under someone’s skin, sometimes you can draw a penalty.”
Korotky was constantly trying to get under his opponents’ skin. “Nikolai Kovalenko and I were going at each other in every game. After the series I told him, ‘We never did drop the gloves.’ He laughed and said, ‘Yeah, but you definitely got me nervous.’ My goal wasn’t to provoke anyone, but if someone came to our crease, I wasn’t going to stay out of it.”
He was ready for a fight with Kovalenko. “At one faceoff I even told him, ‘Let’s drop the gloves.’ He said, ‘Sure,’ but neither of us actually did. We laughed about it afterward.”
Korotky always played a physical game. “Even in junior hockey I loved delivering big hits. I wasn’t afraid to throw them or take them. It’s part of hockey. Back then I’d even edit together highlight videos of my biggest hits and save them on my phone.” However, that came from himself. “I never had a hockey idol. My role model has always been my father. He’s the person I’ve looked up to my whole life because of how determined he is.”
Playing in the juniors helped Korotky a lot. “It made me a different person. I matured, changed my approach to hockey, and became much more professional." He had a lot of attention on himself since a very young age, but he didn’t allow it to distract him. “If you achieve something and stop working, you’re done. Every accomplishment is just another step. I have bigger goals, so I never let myself become satisfied.”
“I can also be an emotional player. If the team loses and I’m not playing well, I get frustrated. When I was younger, I’d get angry at teammates, but over time I realized the first person I have to hold accountable is myself."
His teammates often joke about Korotky’s long hair. “Sergei Plotnikov is always telling me to get a haircut and start looking like a normal person. Maybe one day I will. I don’t believe changing your hairstyle affects how you play anyway.”
Regarding playing in the KHL, he has clear ideas on his favorite opponents. “Neftekhimik,” he says. “They play hockey and let you play hockey too.” It’s the same for his least favorite. “Lokomotiv. They’re like a team of robots.”
With Korotky looking in such great mental shape and the offseason work, it’s easy to think that SKA should aim higher for the upcoming 2026-27 campaign.
