Magic Man to Russia

It has been known since the end of the Detroit Red Wings' season that Pavel Datsyuk was leaving the NHL to play one more season in Russia. Now, we know where in Russia Datsyuk will play, as today, it was made official that he will suit up for SKA Saint Petersburg for the 2016-17 KHL season.

As translated from the HC SKA site (as best as it can from Russian via Google Translate), the deal is for two years and as you can see in the pictures of the immediate aftermath of the signing, he will wear his familiar number 13. No other details have been revealed, but the team as currently constituted will consist of Mikko Koskinen in goal, ex-NHL stars Slava Voynov and Ilya Kovalchuk, and other former players with brief NHL stints such as Sergei Shirokov, Steve Moses, and Sergei Plotnikov that Datsyuk will be joining. After a 2015-16 season of turmoil that followed an improbable run to the club's first major championship the previous season, SKA is eager to put the troubles behind them. From the failed Andrei Nazarov experiment behind the bench to interim head coach Sergei Zubov butting heads with Kovalchuk, it was an interesting season that saw them ultimately make the Conference Finals, only to be swept by the same CSKA team that they upset the previous playoff season by winning all four games after being down 3-0 in the series. Oleg Znarok is going to be the new head coach, and given the team's notorious short leash plus the relatively unknown record of Znarok, it will be interesting to see what the team does.