MAGNITOGORSK, April 30 CSKA Moscow beat Metallurg Magnitogorsk in the seventh match final playoff series of the Continental Hockey League (KHL) and won the main trophy of the tournament — the Gagarin Cup. The meeting in Magnitogorsk ended with a score of 4:1 (2:0, 1:1, 1:0) in favor of the army team. As part of Sergei Fedorov's team, goals were scored by Pavel Karnaukhov (9th minute), Alexander Popov (10), Konstantin Okulov (37) and Vladislav Kamenev (57), who hit an empty net. Philippe Maillet scored against Metallurg (40). The capital club won the series with a score of 4-3. In the course of the final, the army team lost to Metallurg with a score of 1-3, having failed to hit the opponent's goal in the third and fourth matches. For Fedorov, this season was the first at the head of CSKA. For the sixth time in 13 finals, the fate of the Gagarin Cup was determined in the seventh match.
For the second time, CSKA and Metallurg met in the decisive game. Previously, the teams competed for the trophy in seven meetings in 2016, when hockey players from Magnitogorsk turned out to be stronger. Then they were also led by Ilya Vorobyov. On the way to the finals, the army team passed Yaroslavl Lokomotiv (4-0), Moscow Dynamo (4-0) and St. Petersburg SKA (4-3). The team of Ilya Vorobyov turned out to be stronger than Kazakhstan's Barys (4-1), last season's champion Omsk Avangard (4-3) and Chelyabinsk Traktor (4-1). CSKA won the Gagarin Cup for the second time (2019, 2022 ) and in the fourth — the champion of Russia (2015, 2019, 2020, 2022). Metallurg also won the trophy twice (2014, 2016), the club won the silver medal of the Russian Championship for the fourth time (1998, 2004, 2017, 2022).