The SKA Report: Taking Moscow

SKA's week began with a road game in Croatia against Medvescak, and unlike the home opener, the result was a little different.  The first period opened with Ilya Kovalchuk scoring to give SKA the lead, but Mathieu Carle tied the game.  Ryan Vesce gave Medvescak the lead with a goal in the second period and Matt Murley upped the lead to two to open the third period.  Late goals by Roman Cervenka and Kovalchuk forced the game into overtime, giving SKA at least a point in the standings.  However, they would not get any more, as Vesce had the deciding goal in the shootout to hang a loss on Alexander Salak.  Friday saw SKA travel to Moscow and their bitter rivals Dynamo Moscow, who have knocked out SKA in each of the last two playoff meetings.  Evgeny Skachkov and Maxim Chudinov put SKA up 2-0 before Leo Komarov pulled Dynamo within one to close the period.  Komarov would tie the game in the second period before SKA took over in the third period.  Artemy Panarin would score back-to-back goals, and Anton Malyshev and Patrick Thoresen would add on to give SKA and Salak a 6-2 victory in Moscow.  Sunday, SKA stayed in the Moscow region to take on Vityaz.  A scoreless first period gave way to both teams exchanging goals, Tony Martensson for SKA and Anton Korolyov for Vityaz.  Yury Koshkarov would open the third period with a goal for Vityaz, but Kovalchuk's goal halfway through the period would force overtime.  Nothing was settled there, so a shootout was needed, where Kovalchuk scored the winner, putting SKA over the top 3-2 and made a winner of Ilya Ezhov.

SKA travels east to Nizhny Novgorod to face Torpedo and will conclude the week on Thursday with a tilt in Kazan against Ak Bars.  Roman Cervenka is tied for the league lead in points and Kovalchuk is tied for second in the league in goals, with Viktor Tikhonov one spot behind.  Salak is third in GAA.

A New Day for the KHL

Tomorrow, the KHL will kick off its sixth season with Dynamo Moscow and Traktor Chelyabinsk squaring off in a rematch of last year's Gagarian Cup Finals.  Three more games are on the slate Thursday, and SKA Saint Petersburg will kick off their season against Avangard Omsk.  The conclude the opening week with a game on Sunday against Avtomobilist.  There is no game on Saturday, since that will mark the two year anniversary of the plane crash that claimed the lives of the 2011-12 Lokomotiv squad.

Beginning Monday, a weekly report on SKA Saint Petersburg will happen, and should any interesting things happen around the rest of the KHL, it will be talked about here, as well.

HC Dynamo Moscow

HC Dynamo Moscow is a member of the Tarasov Division and along with SKA Saint Petersburg, CSKA, and HC Spartak Moscow, one of the oldest franchises in the KHL, as all four were founded in 1946.  As the current two-time defending Gagarian Cup champions, Dynamo Moscow will have a target on their backs all season, but with players such as Filip Novak and Leo Komarov on their roster, they will be ready as they go for three in a row in the relatively young league.

Getting Kontinental

With the hockey season right around the corner (training camp, really), there's no better time than now to try something new in the Kontinental Hockey League (KHL).  Last year, I went full on into the WHL and the Portland Winterhawks (the weekly piece will return for this coming season), and took on an OHL team in Peterborough (up in the air as to if that weekly piece will return) and even took a brief look into the United States Hockey League (I still have not declared a team at this point, so no weekly segment this season).  This year, I will add the KHL to the list, and I have in fact, declared a team for a weekly segment in the HC SKA Saint Petersburg.

Now, as for what the KHL is about, it is a league that is predominantly based out of Russia and its former republics such as Ukraine and Belarus.  However, expansion has seen it reach the likes of Slovakia, Germany, and this year, Croatia.  The regular season champions are given the Continental Cup while the Yuri Gagarian Cup is given to the champions in the playoffs.  HC Moscow Dynamo is the current two-time defending Gagarian Cup champion and will be looking for three in a row this coming season.  The 28-team league is divided into four division and two conferences: the West comprising of the (Vsevolod) Bobrov and (Anatoli) Tarasov divisions while the East has the (Valeri) Kharlamov and (Arkady) Chernyshev divisions.  As you can see, the divisions are named after people who were influential on hockey in the Soviet-era.  Name players are not lacking in the KHL, as the likes of Alexander Radulov (CSKA), Ilya Kovalchuk (SKA Saint Petersburg), and Alexander Burmistrov (AK Bars Kazan) will call the KHL home for this coming season.

I will get through the teams that make up the KHL and the divisions they play in, as well as who to watch for and odds of success this coming season.