«Salavat Yulaev» lost in a naval battle Even at the finish of the regular season, the defeat of «Avangard» in the last match with «Ak Bars» and the victory of «Salavat Yulaev» over «Magnitka» clearly went into the offset of Omsk, who saved themselves from having to fly to Vladivostok. The Ufa team could not cope with the onslaught of the Admiral — already from the opening match of the series in the capital of Bashkiria, it was clear that the Sailors looked more ready compared to their eminent rival.
The Admiral did not need sparkling filled hockey technically gifted performers. Pragmatism, strength and patience were higher in this duel. “Salavat” can continue to complain about the lack of personnel, but only with the expectation of the next season. The team of Leonid Tambiev had a better understanding of what to do and how. The sensation of the outcome of the confrontation turned out to be only nominal.
SKA overcame the “Canadian” pressure Hardly anyone expected that Minsk “Dynamo” would be able to put up at least some resistance to the strongest club in the championship, but Craig Woodcroft surprised. The older brother of the Edmonton Oilers mentor showed his Canadian roots in time and made the St. Petersburgers endure and sweat. There was also some bloodshed: in the series with Minsk, SKA players suffered a lot physically, having received a considerable number of different types of injuries.
“Canadians play like that, but they have to understand that there are rules. Why don’t our NHL players allow themselves to act in such a way that the opponent can lose more than just health? And Canadians in the KHL play like that. We keep hitting, we have no other options «, — said the SKA coach Roman Rotenberg about the tough game of the «bison».
The class of the St. Petersburg «soldiers» turned out to be decisive in the series. Having regained the advantage in the score in the fifth match (6:3), SKA retained its characteristic intensity and power in the final game in the capital of Belarus and sent the «Canadians» on vacation.
“Lokomotiv” quietly reached the goalThe series of “Lokomotiv” and “Vityaz” has not yet attracted due attention according to its poster, and the course of the confrontation itself only confirmed that this battle will not catch anything significant. Three times out of five matches ended in overtime, and in a duel of strict, closed and systemic hockey, the “railroad workers” turned out to be stronger. And although there is nothing spectacular in the style of Igor Nikita, the necessary result is still achieved. No one will be surprised that Loko made it to the conference finals.
Tkachev and Tolchinsky pulled the Avangard Siberian derby in the first round of the playoffs — eye candy for hockey fans. Spectators and journalists saw exactly what they wanted to see: bright, unpredictable hockey with elements of drama and a fair result. He would be fair no matter what. «Siberia» showed its best hockey and had every chance to stretch the series to all seven matches, but the individual performing class turned out to be decisive.
Sergey Tolchinsky and Vladimir Eduardovich Tkachev put aside the rumors about new contracts with Avangard and took up their direct duties — to play hockey, make a difference and give results. For two, the Russians scored 10 points in five matches.
“Neftekhimik” has become a useful simulator for “Ak Bars” The current playoffs have quickly taught us that even the nominal underdogs have a high chance of success and can kill named favorites. Such an outcome was also real in the derby of Tatarstan, in which Neftekhimik was a tough nut to crack in the battle with Ak Bars. A lot of sweat came down from Kazan in an attempt to overcome the influence of the impudent Nizhnekamsk residents, and this work gave the necessary result. The key advantage of Ak Bars was the goalkeeper line: Neftekhimik lost precisely because of the lack of quality in this component.
“This series allowed us to look at the shortcomings that need to be corrected, we have them. Our opponent is quite good prepared for the next round,» summed up the head coach of «Ak Bars» Zinetula Bilyaletdinov.
«Dynamo» did not have enough strength in pursuit of the pioneers of LarionovIgor Larionov's «Torpedo» during the regular season fell in love with thousands of spectators and hockey fans, but many had doubts about the reliability of the Nizhny Novgorod system in the playoffs. Elimination games are always a different alignment compared to the championship. But Larionov managed to prove the opposite.
«Torpedo» did not change itself and played against a strong and united team of the Moscow «Dynamo» sharply and on the attack. The White-and-Blues, who became famous after the regular season for the fact that each member of the team is aware of their specific tasks for the game, did not find the strength to resist the onslaught of the “fierce car manufacturers”. Aleksey Kudashov also pointed this out: «It's not fear. The team is physically hooked.»
Sparrows postponed the dismissal? Magnitogorsk «Metallurg» over the past couple of months attracted too much negativity. The finalist of last season plunged into a state of crisis. First of all, this affected the game in attack, which became inert, which is unusual for the team of Ilya Vorobyov. By the playoffs, the problem has not disappeared, and Magnitogorsk was very close to literally giving Avtomobilist a ticket to the second round. And along with this, many have already predicted the separation of Vorobyov from Magnitogorsk.
But Pavel Akolzin and Nikolai Goldobin were against such layouts. The first with his hat-trick saved the series for Metallurg and moved it to the seventh match, and the second showed the Goldie show at the most crucial moment. Remarkably, in the decisive match, the Magnitogorsk team also made a comeback, winning back from 1:3. Isn't it a miracle?
The champion's nerves were frayed»No one believed in us,» said Severstal head coach Andrey Razin at the end of the series.
It would be more accurate to say that no one simply expected that a club from Cherepovets with a modest budget will find the resources to give an equal fight to one of the most powerful teams in the league. And although the prerequisites for this were after three wins out of four in the championship, but the playoffs seemed to be fundamentally different. But no. Severstal forced CSKA to respect itself and imposed such a tough fight that the outcome of the series remained in doubt until the middle of the seventh match of the series.
Everything was decided by the nuances. CSKA just added pressure and strength, somewhere the judges made more loyal to the “red-blue” decisions, and in the end the players of “Severstal” simply “ate”. Perhaps CSKA needed just such a series to better prepare for Lokomotiv, another extremely uncomfortable opponent.