Any new hockey season anywhere in the world, as it gets underway, will almost immediately produce any number of “I wonder how this is going to end” storylines – those players, or teams, or situations that catch our interest, and keep us checking back in with the results, standings, and news stories. The 2023-24 campaign in the KHL, now a month old, has been no exception — here are four of the more interesting tales being told in Russia’s top men’s hockey league as we move into the Autumn of 2023.
The Fedotov Saga
We’ve talked a couple of times already about the contract dispute involving CSKA Moscow, the Philadelphia Flyers, and goalie Ivan Fedotov – here, and here, for example. Well, no news is no news, and for now Fedotov continues to play for CSKA as we wait for the IIHF, in whose court the ball resides, to make the next move. The world body’s disciplinary committee will meet at some unspecified future date, and could apply fines or further sanctions to CSKA, Fedotov, or the Russian Hockey Federation. Further news on that when there is further news to report.
In the meantime, the bigger story involving CSKA and Fedotov has been their struggles through the first month of the KHL season. CSKA currently “boast” a 5-7 record and are sitting in eighth place in the 11-team West Conference. And while six West teams have played fewer games than the old Red Army team, only one has played more. Sergei Fedorov, winner of the last two Coach of the Year awards in the KHL, suddenly finds himself on the hot seat, at least a little bit.
As for Fedotov, he has appeared in seven games (about 400 minutes total), and though he has shown some strong play, his .911 sv% currently ranks him 24th out of the 30 goalies who have played more than 200 minutes so far this season (KHL save percentages have traditionally been on the high side, compared to the NHL). A small sample size, obviously, and it is reasonable to expect some rust from Fedotov after a year away from high-level hockey, but both goalie and team need to get some things turned around.
The Continued Adventures of Matvei Andreyevich Michkov
While Fedotov has been working to get back to his old form, another Philadelphia Flyers draft pick, young Matvei Michkov, has been getting some of that “déjà vu all over again.” The 18-year-old forward, chosen 7th overall by the Flyers in this past summer’s NHL draft, began last season in SKA St. Petersburg’s system. But after struggling to break into the senior squad (just four KHL appearances in the first three-and-a-half months of the season), he was loaned out to HK Sochi in December, and finished the 2022-23 season there. There have been dark murmurings that the young man has some of the dreaded “character issues,” but it must be said that he did well at Sochi, scoring 20 points in 27 appearances while playing 16 minutes per game.
So this season, SKA didn’t even wait until December to ship Michkov out. He made just one appearance for the St. Petersburg squad in 2023-24, playing six uneventful minutes, and by mid-September was headed back to the Black Sea coast on loan again. Michkov’s second go-round at Sochi has worked out well both for the young prospect and for his “new” team; he’s again playing 16 minutes a night for Sochi, and has five points in six games played on his current loan stint. As for Sochi, they’ll be pleased to be sitting fifth in the West Conference… especially as they are currently two points ahead of SKA, with the same number of games played.
As for when Flyers fans might expect to see him on Broad Street: on that issue, I am afraid I have absolutely no idea. Michkov’s contract with SKA does not expire until 2026, but there are certainly ways around that. For now, we can only wait, and enjoy watching his development – there’s every chance that he will be a spectacular player.
Imports of Import
The issue of foreign players on Russian teams in the KHL has long been a bone of contention between the league itself and the Russian Ice Hockey Federation. We will discuss this more in a future article, but to make a long story very short: the KHL wants foreign players, and the RIHF doesn’t. Recent legislation in Russia gave the Federation, which operates under the auspices of the Ministry of Sport, some legal clout as regards the issue, and this summer the RIHF reduced the number of foreign players allowed on each Russian KHL team from five to three (the rules are a bit different for non-Russian KHL teams). That’s actually a bit of an oversimplification, but it will do for now.
And of course, the geopolitical situation is having an effect on the presence of foreign players in the league as well. In the wake of the Russian invasion of Ukraine, most European national hockey federations have indicated that they will not choose KHL-based players for their national teams (neither Canada nor the U.S. have made that decision, at least not yet). And some have gone further; at least three Swedish clubs have issued lifetime bans from playing for them to anybody who played in the KHL after the beginning of the invasion. So clearly there are a number of practical disincentives for foreign players looking to continue their careers in Russia.
However, the hockey and the money are both still pretty good in the KHL, and neither the RIHF’s edict nor those of the European federations and clubs has managed to stop foreign players from signing on in the Russian league (again, more detailed discussion of this is to come). In fact, KHL teams have found one fairly obvious way to get around at least the RIHF’s new rules: help their import players obtain Russian citizenship. So far only a couple of players have completed the process; Canadian d-man Cam Lee (Amur Khabarovsk) and American rearguard Brennan Menell (Dynamo Moscow) have been granted Russian citizenship, with SKA St. Petersburg’s Canadian forward Brendan Leipsic also known to have applied. Czech winger Ostap Safin, at Lada Togliatti, also received Russian citizenship this summer, although in his case the process was eased by the fact that he is of Russian ancestry. Whether any other foreign players will go this route, and who they might be, remains to be seen.
Third Time’s the Charm?
It’s a good hockey trivia question: what was the first team from outside Moscow to win a Soviet or Russian national championship? The answer is Lada Togliatti, champions of the old International Hockey League (the successor to the Soviet Championship) in 1994 and 1996. However, the last couple of decades have been a bit unkind to the team from the car-manufacturing hub on the Volga River. Lada were original KHL members in 2008-09, and made their (so far) lone Gagarin Cup playoff appearance that season. In 2010, they were booted to the second-tier VHL due to arena difficulties. Lada came back to the KHL in 2014, only to once again end up in the VHL four seasons later, victims of the KHL’s contraction in 2018. But they’re a popular team, not to mention a famous name, and Lada did enough to earn readmission to the KHL this past summer, slotting into the East Conference’s Kharlamov Division.
And while we are still in the earliest of days in this new season, things have gone pretty well for Lada as they begin their third stint in the KHL, despite icing a lineup full of “oh, so that’s what happened to…” players (full disclosure: I have a very soft spot for that kind of team). Journeyman goalie Vladislav Podyapolsky has been among the best in the league this season, posting a .952 sv% through 11 games, while Canadian centreman and former Pittsburgh Penguins prospect Troy Joseph has provided useful scoring (12 gp, 6-5-11). And while Lada’s 6-6 record appears middling at first glance, it hides the fact that Lada have lost only three times in regulation — and those losses came in the first three games of the season. Since then, it’s been six regulation wins from nine matches overall, and at least a point in all nine of those games.
Can Lada make a first KHL playoff appearance since way back in 2009? There are, of course, miles to go yet, but the early signs are encouraging, useful points have been banked, and it would be lovely to see them pull it off.
