There was only one game on the KHL schedule on Wednesday, November 15th and it featured CSKA Moscow, who have intrigued me this year with Sergei Fedorov really capturing my interest as a head coach despite their relative underperformance to what you would expect from the biggest giants in Russian hockey, especially after their two consecutive Gagarin Cup victories and three consecutive finals appearances the last three seasons (with their streak of appearances going back five years, all told, winning in 2019 in addition to the last two seasons). Additionally, CSKA, due to the Ivan Fedotov quagmire, have one of the most intense and fascinating off-ice narratives going on around them this year. Further, with HC Sochi and SKA Saint Petersburg being CSKA’s next two opponents, I decided this would be good as a preview for when the primary teams covered herein face them again and for diversifying the scope of this series. With all of this in mind, here is what I took away from watching this interconference KHL matchup.

Nominally, there isn’t much of a difference between the two clubs in this game, as CSKA Moscow and Amur Khabarovsk entered this match with identical win percentages in games resolved in overtime (the two being 12-12 and 11-11 going into it, respectively). However, distinctions can be drawn by way of their positioning, with CSKA in the middle of the pack in the Western Conference, but Amur being just barely on the outside looking in in the East (trailing eighth place Sibir Novosibirsk by just one point). It should be noted that Amur is in a tighter race/arguably a more “competitive” conference this year, with CSKA’s capital city rivals Dynamo and Spartak seeming to stand out the most as the strongest clubs and doing so in the points sense (the two are second and first, respectively, with 45 points, seven points ahead of third and fourth place Lokomotiv Yaroslavl and Torpedo Nizhny Novgorod) in addition to their excellent performance and impressive stats among their playing group. CSKA, however, have a better roster, and one of the best coaches in the league in Fedorov. It was going to be compelling to see how this played out.

Amur appeared to have gotten on the board just under three and a half minutes in; however, the goal was waved off due to the net becoming dislodged, which was upheld upon review. This would not deter Amur from being aggressive on the attack for the remainder of the first period, however. CSKA G Dmitry Gamzin would be peppered with 17 shots despite Amur having over a minute and a half less time on attack during the opening frame, with CSKA mustering just 8 SOGs in this time frame. Ultimately, neither team would get the puck over the goal line in the opening stanza, however. The scoring would ultimately be opened 5 minutes and 3 seconds into the second frame by CSKA D/captain Nikita Nesterov, on a terrific one-time blast on a feed from C Mikhail Grigorenko after a back-and-forth between the two. Ultimately, Amur would respond on the power play within the last ten minutes of regulation after the game reached something of a stalemate in the second period (with the shots on net being 10-9 in favor of CSKA). D Alexander Shchemerov ripped a one-timer past Gamzin above the circles on a pass from F/former Boston Bruin Alexander Khokhlachev. However, Amur D Viktor Baldayev went to the box for a trip on RW Prokhor Poltapov (BUF, 33rd overall, 2021). Sure enough, in kind, Nesterov would score his second goal of the game (marking his first multi-goal game in nearly a calendar year) on yet another one-timer, this time with the primary assist going to C Maxim Sorkin and Grigorenko getting secondary helper with 4:05 remaining. Ultimately, the last minute empty net efforts with G Igor Babkov pulled would amount to nothing for Amur, and CSKA would hold on to win 2-1 despite being outshot 37 to 30 while also having 24 of their own shots blocked and losing at the draw 35 to 29. While this move them to only fifth place in the Western Conference, short of the dominance you would expect from a club with this pedigree, I think this was a testament to Sergei Fedorov’s group being able to win any sort of game, which is definitely something I have observed the few times I have watched them this year. Perhaps they are another team, like their Army Derby rivals SKA Saint Petersburg, that will get better as the season goes along and will make a mark when it matters the most: The Gagarin Cup playoffs. I am still of the mind that the West will be led by Spartak, but you never know if the winning culture will take over for CSKA when it needs to.

In terms of standings implications, this broke the tie between CSKA and SKA, moving the former solidly into fifth place, ahead by two points (though SKA notably have a game in hand). As noted, their next two opponents are HC Sochi on Saturday, the 18th, and SKA on Monday, the 20th. The overarching narrative has the former being a team that has defeated them only once ever since entering the KHL in 2014; however, even in a vacuum, it SHOULD be a walkover. Sochi has now lost nine straight with only one OT losing point to their name in that streak and no victories since they last faced SKA Saint Petersburg in yet another 5-4 victory against Matvei Michkov (PHI, 7th overall, 2023)’s contract club/Marat Khusnutdinov (MIN, 37th overall, 2020)’s former team and it seems hard to imagine that streak coming to an end here. As such, while nothing is ever an absolute lock, they should face their rivals in both tradition and the standings coming off a win and two points as they jockey for position in pursuit of the better playoff seeding. SKA has been on good form recently, however, and while CSKA has shown some strength and resourcefulness this year, they also did have a four game losing skid recently before beating Neftekhimik Nizhnekamsk and now Amur (including a 4-0 defeat to Traktor Chelyabinsk which was historic and could bode well for Sochi’s chances in their own matchup with them). We shall see what the outcome is when these two titans of Russian ice hockey do battle with one another.