Nabokov’s agent Isakov: “For Evgeny Russia isn’t an empty word” (Photo © Getty Images)

After the announcement of Nabokov’s signing with SKA St. Petersburg, Russian popular portal Sport day by day had an interview with agent Sergei Isakov, in which he talked about the negotiating with SKA, about Nabokov’s family and about the length of the contract they signed with Alexander Medvedev’s team.

RussianHockeyFans.com offers you a translation.

Isakov: “I met SKA’s representatives more than once. At first we couldn’t agree about some fundamental terms of the contract. So there were moments that should have been discussed in detail. But in any case I felt that if SKA would want to approach us again they would have done the right thing.”

– Surely a goalie of Nabokov’s level would interest most of KHL teams. Was there concurrency for SKA?

Isakov: “Honestly speaking SKA was the only team we talked to. We weren’t hasting trying to find a team. As a result yesterday we settled all the problems with SKA. It’s a team with big traditions. They have a good roster. It’s time for them to win the title. And, of course, you can’t win without a good goalie. And Nabokov is the number one.”

– Evgeny played for 13 seasons with San Jose. Maybe it was disappointing for him not to get an offer from the Sharks?

Isakov: “Of course the years spent in San Jose gave him a lot. You might have understood that Evgeny doesn’t like to change places. In his career he played only for Dynamo Moscow and for San Jose. And one year in Magnitogorsk during the lock-out. Regarding the contract with the Sharks, their GM Ron Wilson thanked him for the years spent within the team. And that the Flyers were really interested in him and he was ready to trade his rights. But his agent in the NHL Don Meehan couldn’t get anything concrete.”

– Nabokov’s wife, Tabitha, is American. How ready is she to move to Russia?

Isakov: “I met her two weeks ago in Las Vegas. She told me that she would have come living in Russia with pleasure and that she really wanted that her son and daughter would study in Russian. You know, Evgeny is a good family man. He didn’t only agree with me to transfer to SKA. He agreed with his wife first. This was one of the most important moments before the signing of the contract.”

– In the last interviews I had with Nabokov I had the impression that he’d rather stay in North America.

Isakov: “Maybe. But he give me the task to conduct the negotiating with SKA and thus this mean that he also wanted to play in the KHL. Evgeny knows that, playing here, he would have more chances to play for the Russian national team. For him the word Russia isn’t an empty sound.”

– For how long Evgeny can play for SKA?

Isakov: “The contract is a four-year deal. We signed this specially for the Sochi Olympic Games. He’s thinking about finishing his career in 2010 after winning the gold medal with Russia.”

Evgeny Nabokov signs with SKA of the KHL (Photo © Avelar/AP)

Evgeny Nabokov has signed a 4-year, $24-million contract with SKA St. Petersburg of the KHL, as reported by the Russian newspaper Sovetsky Sport.

In the 10 seasons he played in California he recorded a 293-215-29 record, with a 2.39 goals against average. He also was awarded with the Calder Trophy of the top rookie of the year in 2001.

Sharks to part with Nabokov (Photo © Avelar/AP)

After 10 years and 563 games Evgeny Nabokov is going to part ways with the San Jose Sharks. As Nabokov’s contract will run out next week, the team’s General Manager Doug Wilson stated that the Sharks will walk away from one of the team’s cornerstones players.

Evgeny Nabokov will be the most interesting goalie in the summer’s free agency. In the 10 seasons he played in California he recorded a 293-215-29 record, with a 2.39 goals against average. He also was awarded with the Calder Trophy of the top rookie of the year in 2001.

Nabokov was interested in signing a new contracts with the Sharks, but now he’ll have to find himself a new team.

As the free agency will start on July 1st NHL betting will move from results to signings. As one of the top NHL goalies, many teams will try to secure Nabokov’s sign, even if it’s unlikely that he’ll ink again a $6,000,000 contract. Other Russians available include Ilya Kovalchuk, Sergei Gonchar and Alexander Frolov.

2010 Olympics: Team Russia aftermath (Photo © sovsport.ru)

The 2010 Olympic Hockey Tournament has probably been the biggest disappointing ever for Team Russia. The early quarterfinal elimination against Team Canada was the worst result ever.

As soon as the tournament was over for Russia, we published the Top 5 reasons for this fail, now RussianHockeyFans.com judged all the players on the roster.

Goalkeepers

Ilya Bryzgalov: B+
He played a good game against Slovakia, but he got a L and thus he got benched in the following matches. He should have get more chances.

Evgeny Nabokov: D
In the first match against Latvia he didn’t look too good, but it was an easy game. Against the Czechs he did his job, but in the quarterfinals he had just a terrible night. He should have been benched earlier. He was really disappointing.

Defencemen

Andrei Markov: C+
Unfortunately he wasn’t in his best shape. He tried hard being useful for his team but he didn’t play his best and also he didn’t get enough ice time.

Anton Volchenkov: C+
One of the best blueliners for this team. He always tried hard, blocked a lot of shots, played physically. But against Canada he didn’t particularly stand out .

Dmitriy Kalinin: C
He didn’t look out of place. He wasn’t team Russia’s best blueliner but he did his job.

Sergei Gonchar: C
Just like Markov he didn’t get too much ice time. And he appeared in the score sheet only once.

Fedor Tyutin: C-
He didn’t do anything special. As a NHL player he should have bring more to the team.

Ilya Nikulin: C-
He didn’t make disasters, but it showed that he’s not used to face elite level competition and he faced some hard time in the own zone.

Denis Grebeshkov: C-
He didn’t impress, even in the round robin games. He still has a lot of room for improvements, but he has to deliver better performances.

Konstantin Korneev: C-
He didn’t look bad, but he was the only pointless player on the roster. The CSKA captain didn’t look out of place in the round robin, even if he has been played most of times in an unusual and unexpected role. His ice time has been limited in the game against Canada.

Forwards

Sergei Fedorov: C+
The proof that you can be a good player even at 40. Even if he looked a bit slow, he played well throughout the whole tournament and despite the infamous quarterfinal game he was one of the best players in Team Russia jersey.

Evgeni Malkin: C
Malkin, just like most of the forwards, played fairly well in the round robin matches, but he didn’t show up when it mattered more.

Pavel Datsyuk: C
Maybe he didn’t gel with his linemates, but Datsyuk didn’t really impress during these Olympic games, he didn’t look the key player he is for the Red Wings, just think about the shoot out attempt against Slovakia.

Alexei Morozov: C
Team Russia’s captain tried hard, but didn’t impress too much. He scored an important goal against the Slovaks, but that’s pretty much all.

Maxim Afinogenov: C
He went unpleasantly unnoticed in the first couple of games, then he improved a bit and scored a nice, yet unuseful, goal against the Canadians.

Danis Zaripov: C-
The ZZM line has always had good chemistry, too bad in Vancouver they played on small ice…He did fairly well in the first couple of games, then he slept away.

Viktor Kozlov: C-
His call was questionable, and he didn’t do too much to make people change idea. That being said, he could have get a chance in the shootouts against Slovakia.

Alexander Radulov: C-
Radulov didn’t play bad, but not great either. He almost spoiled the party against the Slovaks when he missed a chance, got a penalty and then injured Zinoviev, but he probably deserved more ice time.

Sergei Zinoviev: C-
Kudos for playing in the quarterfinals on one leg, but he should have sat on the bench, especially after that terrible turnover in the neutral zone that led Canadians to a goal.

Alexander Ovechkin: D
Perhaps the biggest disappointment of the tournament as he was the most awaited player. He was a no factor against Canada and overall lost the phenom fight against Crosby.

Ilya Kovalchuk: D
What a difference between the Kovalchuk we admired at the last two WC in Quebec and Switzerland. He looked more the player on ice at the Turin Olympics. One goal is definitely not enough for a player of his caliber.

Alexander Semin: D
Just like other Russian superstar forwards, he didn’t show up.

Vladislav Tretiak: “Nabokov will start in the quarterfinal” (Photo © Jacques Boissinot/The Canadian Press)

Team Russia’s general manager at the Olympic Games, Vladislav Tretiak, gave an interview to Vitaliy Slavin of SovSport. Tretiak talked about the canceled practice on Monday, seriousness of Sergei Zinoviev’s injury and the players’ thoughts on a possible Russia-Canada quarterfinal.

RussianHockeyFans.com offers you a translation.

– Why did you cancel a practice on Monday?
Tretiak: “The coaches decided to give the players time to recover. The ice practice was optional and nobody wanted to skate. Everyone went to the gym and rode bikes. By the way, we are not the only team to cancel a practice. The Americans and Swedes also did it.”

– But Team Canada practiced. And what an intense practice it was – 10 exercises for 40 minutes!
Tretiak: “Well, Canada lost to the USA one day before, so they had to bring negative emotions down.”

– How is Sergei Zinoviev doing? Earlier there was information that the season was over for him.
Tretiak: “Yes, at first the doctors thought that the injury was that serious. However, after another examination the injury was found to be not very serious. On Tuesday he will try to practice with a special corset and then the coaches will decide if he’ll play in the quarterfinal. But Sergei himself is eager to hit the ice.”

– What did you think when you learned that Russia could face Canada in the quarterfinal?
Tretiak: “I thought that the world would see a battle of giants. That this is our fate, face Canada not in the final, as everyone hoped, but in the quarterfinal. Life is testing us and we have no choice. If we want to win the gold we have to defeat any opponent in the quarterfinal.”

– How did the players react?
Tretiak: “With no worry, just like me. It’s our fate.”

– Have Russia started preparing for the game against Canada already?
Tretiak: “Yes, soon Nabokov and I will study highlights from the Canada-USA game. By the way, Nabokov has already watched the game once again closely.”

– So Nabokov will start in the quarterfinal game?
Tretiak: “Yes.”

Ovechkin, Gonchar, Kovalchuk, Volchenkov talk about Czech Republic, hit on Jagr (Photo © Alex Livesey/Getty Images)

After the 4-2 victory against Czech Republic many players agreed that the Ovechkin hit on Jagr turned the momentum in Russia‘s favor. Team Russia players felt that this was the key event of the game and it helped their team getting the edge over Czech Republic.

RussianHockeyFans.com offers you a translation of short quotes taken right after the game from Sergei Gonchar, Ilya Kovalchuk, Evgeny Nabokov, Alexander Ovechkin and Anton Volchenkov.

“Ovechkin has a very good physical play, that’s why he always tries to pressure the opponents”, Sergei Gonchar told Sport-Express. “Successful actions are always reflected to the team’s morale. This was the case of today’s game. I think the first line played very well.”

Ilya Kovalchuk agrees with him: “It was good when Ovechkin hit Jagr”, Kovalchuk said to Sovietskiy Sport. “He played hard, we got the puck and quickly scored the 3-1 goal. That helped us a lot. Hopefully Zinoviev will be allright. We will play for him too.”

Also Evgeny Nabokov felt that Ovechkin’s hit changed the flow of the game. “The hit on Jagr by Ovechkin was one of the most important moments of the game. Ovechkin is Ovechkin. In any situation he shows who he is and why he’s different from any other player”, he told Sovietskiy Sport. “These games are never easy. It was a very important game for us. We wanted to get the first seed in the Group B and get a bye for the quarterfinals. The game was very intense. It had plenty of shots on goal and battles in the slot. On the powerplays, the Czechs put two players in front of me so to cover my vision. A couple of times they managed to do so that I lost the puck from my field of vision, but the defensemen manage to clear it. The hardest moment was when we were up 3-2 as in such situations usually the opponents give you a good pressure.”

But Alexander Ovechkin himself played down the event a little bit, stating through Sovietskiy Sport that “every shift is important as it’s part of the game. When you want to help your team and play harder, and you are successful in that, you can wake up your team. I wasn’t the only one to play hard, all my team mates fought hard and did everything they could.”

Also Anton Volchenkov wanted to share his opinion, published at Sovietskiy Sport: “The most important part of the game was Kozlov’s goal. We finished the second period ahead. And in the third period Ovechkin had a great hit on Jagr. I know what hits are. That was an outstanding hit and after it we even scored. This too was a really important moment of the game.”

Translation by RussianHockeyFans.com

2010 Olympics: Russia – Czech Republic preview (Photo © Bruce Bennett/Getty Images)

Team Russia‘s opponent in the third round robin match of the 2010 Olympic Tournament will be team Czech Republic. The Czechs, lead by the evergreen Jaromir Jagr, feature a very good lineup with plenty of NHL caliber players.

Russia has to skate past Czech Republic in order to secure the first seed in the Group B and get a bye into the quarterfinals. The Czechs are on the top of the standings with six points in two games. The Slovaks follow with five points, but they played three games.

Team Russia will try hard to put the 1-2 defeat against Slovakia in the past. “It’s always tough to lose, but it’s good to have it happen now in the tournament,” Alexander Ovechkin told espn.com.

Most likely team Russia’s lineup will undergo many changes. Vyacheslav Bykov will swap Evgeni Malkin and Pavel Datsyuk. “We try different combinations”, said Bykov to sportbox.ru, “so that it would be possible to vary the lines if necessary.”

With this changes Ovechkin and Malkin will be paired together. “I think that now in our line there will be more speed and physical play”, Ovechkin told Sovietskiy Sport. “We have to play our game and try not to do too much, or we won’t be successfull.”

Evgeny Nabokov is going to get another start after the first win over Latvia, while Sergei Fedorov is going to play after missing a practice.

The puck is going to be dropped at the local 12 AM.

Team Russia latest news: Fedorov misses practice, Kovalchuk out of Malkin’s line, Nabokov to start against Czechs (Photo © Shaun Best, Reuters)

Here is the latest news from the Russian team at the Olympic Games 2010 in Vancouver.

Evgeny Nabokov will start in the game against the Czech Republic
Igor Zakharkin, Russian coach to Pavel Lysenkov of SovSport: “We think that with Nabokov in the net our players feel more confident.”

Sergei Fedorov missed a practice
Zakharkin: “Fedorov has an individual program. But he’s alright, there is no injury.”

New lines in the game against the Czech Republic
Zakharkin: “Maybe we are going to swap the center forwards. We think that Kovalchuk’s efficiency should be higher. We remember what chemistry Malkin and Kovalchuk had at the World Championship 2008, but two years have passed and they are different players now, their styles changed too. There is a bit of imbalance on the Kovalchuk-Malkin-Afinogenov line. We hope to fix it.”

Only first three shootout players were known beforehand in the game against the Slovaks
Zakharkin: “We knew who would have first three shootout attempts, but when it went on… Bykov has a good intuition, but this time it didn’t work. We hoped that the game wouldn’t get to the shootout. Now we are going to make a list of players beforehand.”

New power play lines
According to Mikhail Zislis of Sport-Express, the new power play lines look like this:
1. Alexander Ovechkin – Pavel Datsyuk – Evgeni Malkin, Kovalchuk – Gonchar
2. Alexander Semin – Viktor Kozlov – Alexander Radulov, Andrei Markov – Ilya Nikulin.
Ovechkin and Radulov were positioned in front of the goalie, screening him.

Update: Team Russia’s coaches swap Malkin with Datsyuk
According to sports.ru, the new top two lines look like this:
1. Alexander Ovechkin – Evgeni Malkin – Alexander Semin, Sergei Gonchar – Fedor Tyutin.
2. Ilya Kovalchuk – Pavel Datsyuk – Maxim Afinogenov, Konstantin Korneev – Denis Grebeshkov.
The other two lines remain the same:
3. Alexei Morozov – Sergei Zinoviev – Danis Zaripov, Ilya Nikulin – Andrei Markov.
4. Viktor Kozlov – Sergei Fedorov – Alexander Radulov, Dmitriy Kalinin – Anton Volchenkov.

Translation by RussianHockeyFans.com

Russia gets the first Olympic win over Latvia (Photo © Getty Images)

Russia got an easy win in the first game of the 2010 Olympics against Latvia. Team Russia didn’t look overly impressive, most likely saving some energy for the games against better opponents. Alexander Ovechkin and Danis Zaripov scored two goals each in team Russia’s 8-2 win.

KHL players got the first two goals of the match. Danis Zaripov opened the score after a couple of minutes thanks a great pass by Sergei Fedorov, while Alexander Radulov made it a 2-0 game at 7:46. Alexander Ovechkin scored the third goal for Russia with only thirty seconds to go in the first period.

In the second period Russia relaxed and left little room to Lavtia. They scored only one goal, with Evgeni Malkin.

The third stanza has been more frenetic, at least on its start. Latvia stripped out Evgeny Nabokov of the shut out with a goal by Herberts Vasiljevs. After this goal Russia pushed the gas and got three quick goals, with Ovechkin, Zaripov and Ilya Kovalchuk. A quick shot by Gints Ankipans surprised Nabokov for the 7-2. Alexei Morozov scored the eight goal for Russia with just about one minute to play.

Evgeni Nabokov stopped 18 shots for Russia.

Team Russia’s next match will be on February 18th against Team Slovakia.

Ovechkin might be paired with Malkin; Nabokov and Bryzgalov to share ice time (Photo © Getty Images)

Team Russia’s coach Igor Zakharkin gave a few interviews where he stated that Alexander Ovechkin (Washington Capitals) and Evgeni Malkin (Pittsburgh Penguins) might play on the same line, and that goalkeepers Evgeny Nabokov (San Jose Sharks) and Ilya Bryzgalov (Phoenix Coyotes) will both play during the robin-round at the Olympic Games in Vancouver.

Zakharkin on Ovechkin-Malkin to olympics10.ru

– Is there a chance to see Ovechkin and Malkin playing on the same line?
Zakharkin: “Maybe not since the very beginning but somewhere in the middle of the game or during power plays. We will think about it. We are also taking into account the fact that quite often Ovechkin plays on the left wing for the Capitals.”

Zakharkin on Nabokov-Bryzgalov to sport-express.ru

– How are you going to share ice time between Nabokov and Bryzgalov?
Zakharkin: “We are going to use both Nabokov and Bryzgalov during the round-robin. But I can’t say who’s going to play in certain games.”

Translation by RussianHockeyFans.com

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