A plane carrying the KHL team Lokomotive Yaroslavl has crashed in Russia killing 36 (or is it 43) people on board and this is not the way I would like to begin a story. It’s already been a horrendous summer with the passing of three fine hockey players. But it’s happened and it’s shocking, and the link to [...]

With the news that both Brent Sopel and Alex Kovalev have signed with Russian teams in the Kontinental Hockey League, I thought it important that we find out a little about their new places. Kovalev is moving to Mytishchi in the outskirts of Moscow, and will be playing for Atlant Moscow Oblast, which up until [...]

Below is my son-in-law and great friend Denis Brel, who took the photos. Unfortunately, Denis has been a Pittsburgh fan for a long time and I suppose it’s his only flaw. The following photos, aside from the cheerleaders shot of course, are of St. Petersburg SKA players taking the shootout. Unfortunately for hometown fans, SKA, maybe a little overconfident, lost [...]

St. Petersburg SKA, sitting high in the standings, boasts several players who had careers in the NHL. Alexei Yashin, Maxim Afinogenov, Sergei Zubov, Evgeny Artyukhin, Sergei Brylin, and Evgeny Nabokov, all seasoned ex-NHLers, play here, although no Canadians are on the squad. I think for most North Americans, living and playing in Russia can be a [...]

My old friend Denis Brel, in St. Petersburg, Russia, was at a Kontinental Hockey League (KHL) game recently between the hometown, first-place SKA (in blue) and visiting basement-dwellars Vityaz Chekhov, a game in which Chekhov upset the big shots 5-4 in a shootout.  Denis has sent along some nice photos. The player dropping the puck (name unknown) in the middle picture [...]

My son-in law in Russia, who is also an old friend, was just at a KHL game in St. Petersburg and took a veritable cornucopia of nice photos while he was there. Beginning sometime tomorrow, I’ll be showing glimpses of the game through his photos in a three-part series. It’ll give you some kind of insight on what [...]