All semi-finalists have been determined in the Fonbet play-offs of the Kontinental Hockey League

All semi-finalists have been determined in the Fonbet play-offs of the Kontinental Hockey League. Lokomotiv nevertheless defeated Avangard in the seventh match – 2:0, and Metallurg closed the series with Spartak in the sixth, winning 3:0. Yaroslavl will now play with Traktor, and Magnitogorsk will play with Avtomobilist. The semi-finals start on April 2 and 3.

It was difficult to imagine that the series Avangard and Lokomotiv will stretch to seven matches, given how overwhelming the Yaroslavl club’s superiority in play sometimes looked, which was reflected in the score. Even after the Omsk team had some luck in overtime of the third match, they were defeated again and were practically in a hopeless situation, losing 1:3. Then they lost during the fifth and sixth meetings, nevertheless they pulled them out and brought the matter to the decisive seventh.

Tellingly, the return of the “hawks” to the series occurred after the seemingly hasty resignation of Mikhail Kravets and the appointment of his assistant Sergei Zvyagin as acting head coach. The formerly famous goalkeeper quickly stabilized the critical situation and scored three wins in four matches.

It seemed that Avangard would already have a psychological advantage in the seventh game, which was also helped by their home walls. But Lokomotiv stoically endured the latest setbacks and showed that they were not broken at all, continuing to act as usual from a position of strength.

In the first period, the guests attacked twice as much and outscored the opponent 11:2, so it is not surprising that one of their shots reached the goal. Moreover, the railwaymen’s forward Artur Kayumov, having picked up a neutral puck at high speed, single-handedly skated towards goalkeeper Pavel Khomchenko.

However, Avangard is also used to constantly winning back in this series. In the second twenty minutes, the hosts managed to move the epicenter of events to someone else’s goal and significantly increase the pressure on Yaroslavl goalkeeper Daniil Isaev. True, the most striking save was made by his Omsk colleague, when the puck, after a standard throw into the zone, unexpectedly bounced off the board on a dime. There was an almost empty target in front of Georgiy Ivanov, but Khomchenko deftly played a trap in a spectacular jump. The Hawks also failed to score, and after two periods Lokomotiv still led 1:0.

But as soon as the third segment of the match started, the guests ran away two on one, and Maxim Berezkin doubled the advantage. The forward decided to do everything himself, dealt with the defender one-on-one, putting him on the ice, and threw the puck under Khomchenko’s pancake. In the previous match, Avangard also gave a two-goal head start, but then it had much more time to save. And now there was no way to break through Isaev. And Lokomotiv’s field players aggressively cleared the space in front of their goalkeeper. When Reed Boucher in one of the episodes was about to send the puck into an unprotected goal, Rushan Rafikov managed to block his stick. The railwaymen held on even in the minority towards the end of the third period. Then the Omsk team tried to change something else in the six-on-five format by removing Khomchenko from the court, and still didn’t score.

Lokomotiv kept the score 2:0 and won a ticket to the semi-finals of the Gagarin Cup, where they will face off against Traktor. In the quarterfinals, the Chelyabinsk club defeated the winner of the regular season, Dynamo Moscow, in just four matches.

In the final quarter-final series, he was on the verge of elimination. “Spartacus”inferior “Metallurg” 2:3. Although in this confrontation the teams won exclusively at home, but now they met in Moscow, so according to the scenario, everything seemed to be heading towards the seventh match. But the Magnitogorsk residents had other plans.

In addition, the red-and-whites suffered two serious personnel losses: their main goalkeeper Dmitry Nikolaev was absent due to illness, and leading defender Michal Czajkowski dropped out due to injury.

Muscovites’ reserve goalkeeper Andrei Kareev also took part in the fifth game, when he had to urgently replace Nikolaev after conceding three goals. Then, thanks to him, Spartak almost organized a comeback, and now he has repeatedly helped out his teammates. However, too many dangerous moments arose near his goal, and one of them ended with Roman Kantserov hitting the near top corner with a pass from Dmitry Silantiev.

It was still difficult for Kareev, but Ilya Nabokov also saved Metallurg more than once, especially when Spartak seized the initiative for a long time and had the majority. Once Mikhail Maltsev even hit the post, and the hosts immediately launched a counterattack that led to a goal. Denis Zernov burst into the zone on the left edge, got close to the goalkeeper and threw the puck into the net, and the same Silantiev gave him the scoring pass. Moreover, the red and white conceded at the end of the second period and left themselves little chance of success.

In the third twenty-minute period, the guests turned into a defense that the Muscovites could not break through, while they themselves made a blunder after a throw-in at their goal and allowed Nikita Mikhailis to shoot them at point-blank range. With the score 0:3 ten minutes before the siren, Spartak had simply zero chance of another match in the playoffs. Alexey Zhamnov’s team didn’t even have enough prestige to score a goal when they played with six against four after Danila Yurov was sent off from the Steelworkers.

Having won 3:0, Metallurg completed the series – 4:2. In the semi-finals, he will be opposed by Avtomobilist, who previously knocked SKA out of the Gagarin Cup, having spent only five matches on one of the main favorites of the tournament. In general, only one representative of the Western Conference remained in the fight for the main KHL trophy, and the eastern clubs had already guaranteed themselves a place in the finals.

Alexander Ilyin