Superiority in class: Avangard and SKA won clean victories and reached the quarterfinals of the Gagarin Cup

Boucher's double and Tkachev's assists

Avangard, as expected, became the second team in the east after Avtomobilist to advance to the next round of the playoffs.

Omsk were considered the clear favorites in the confrontation with Lada and fully justified their status.

The only thing is that they allowed the opponent to take over in one match at home.

However, just a day later the series ended at the G-Drive Arena.

And the main character again became Reed Boucher.

The best sniper of the regular season distinguished himself in all meetings with the Togliatti team, except one, and in the third he scored a hat-trick.

This time he scored twice, both times on the power play.

And the unwitting evil genius among the guests was Maxim Berezin.

In the opening period, he was sent off for playing with a high stick, and immediately after the break - for holding up an opponent.

The American calmly, in his signature manner, completed his partners’ passes from close range.

Both times he was assisted by Vladimir Tkachev, who already has seven successful passes to his credit.

With these indicators, he is the leader in the current Gagarin Cup season.

Boucher led the sniper race with seven goals.

Along the way, he turned out to be only the second hockey player in history to score 50 or more goals in the KHL, taking into account both the regular season and the playoffs.

Boucher now has 51, and is close to breaking Sergei Mozyakin's record (55).

In addition to the North American, Tomas Jurcho and Mikhail Belyaev also scored on goal.

And Pavel Khomchenko scored his debut shutout in the league's knockout matches.

Serebryakov's shutout and Rotenberg's successful screening

Much more was expected from the meetings between SKA and Torpedo, despite the fact that the Nizhny Novgorod team fell into a crisis in 2024 and slid to seventh place in the west, and in the opening round they ended up with the St. Petersburg team.

But in the first away match they unexpectedly gained the upper hand, and in the second they lost only in a long overtime.

Unfortunately for fans of the “automaker”, they didn’t seem to have enough strength for the rest.

The support of fans at his native Nagorny did not help either.

And the end was set already at the SKA Arena.

Despite the fact that Igor Larionov’s team needed a bloody nose to win, it only became active in episodes.

In the opening period, the guests made only two shots on target.

Even the majority failed to create anything.

Moreover, it turned into a missed goal.

Before Sergei Tolchinsky had time to jump out of the penalty box, he received a longitudinal pass from Stepan Falkovsky, ran towards the other goal and left no chance for Ivan Kulbakov.

After the break, Torpedo looked more interesting and even forced Nikita Serebryakov to make several saves.

Vasily Atanasov, who recovered from injury, also reminded of himself.

But shortly before the break, Grigory Kuzmin distinguished himself in unequal lineups, and the position of the opponents became completely difficult.

True, the Nizhny Novgorod team, even with such an unimpressive game, still almost revived the intrigue.

Shortly before the final siren, Nikita Artamonov finished off a shot into the net after another save from Serebryakov.

However, Roman Rotenberg took the call for offside, and the referees took his side.

And in the end, when the opponents took off the goalkeeper, Artyom Sergeev hit the empty target.

Time for the young for Metallurg

While Avangard easily dealt with Lada, Metallurg, which took first place in the regular season in the east, unexpectedly faced great difficulties in the confrontation with the modest Amur.

If on the eve of the series someone had said that after four meetings the score would be equal, the forecast would not have been taken seriously.

But at a difficult moment, when it seemed that the team’s self-confidence was shaken, the youth led him.

Already in the opening, the Lynx played a neat combination, taking advantage of the opponents’ unsuccessful attack, and it was completed by 21-year-old Danil Gololobov.

Shortly before the break, Roman Kantserov, born in 2004, entered the zone and threw at the neighbor, but Igor Bobkov, who had worked miracles in previous meetings, did not help out.

Finally, at the very beginning of the second segment, Magnitogorsk’s best sniper in the regular championship, Danila Yurov, made his presence known.

After that, Andrei Martemyanov exchanged Bobkov for Dmitry Lozebnikov, who, unlike his competitor, did not miss.

And the guests even reduced the gap in the end in the majority.

Now they will try to restore balance in Khabarovsk on March 11.

Dynamo's killer majority

And the duel with teammates from Minsk is not easy for Dynamo Moscow, although it stopped one step away from reaching the second round.

Both fights in Belarus took a lot of nerve cells from the current Continental Cup winners.

In the first they lost completely, and in the second they tipped the scales on their side only in overtime.

The last game turned out to be absolutely equal.

In the first and second periods, the opponents even made the same number of shots, although the hockey players more often engaged in power duels than created chances.

And in the 29th minute, Dmitry Kvartalnov’s squad even took the lead.

But the blue and white were once again rescued by the unique majority and Cedric Paquette personally.

After the break, Vadim Moroz went to the bench, and the Canadian, who had recovered from injury, intercepted Nikita Gusev's pass.

By the way, the Russian scored his 100th anniversary point in the KHL playoffs.

It seemed that the guests would put the finishing touches on their opponents, but instead, after just 33 seconds, they allowed Rob Hamilton to score in an evenly matched field.

However, soon Roman Gorbunov made a block and earned a minor fine.

And Paquette cleverly opened up on the spot and sent the puck into the empty target.

As a result, the fate of the match was decided only in overtime.

Given the intransigence of the teams, it was expected that it would drag on for a long time, but the end was set in less than five minutes.

Moreover, Egor Rimashevsky upset Alexey Kolosov.

Along the way, the forward, at the age of 19 years and 1 month, became the youngest goal scorer for Dynamo in the Gagarin Cup.

“Salavat Yulaev” is one step away from failure

And Salavat Yulaev stood on the verge of relegation, although at the end of the regular season they tried to force Metallurg and Avangard to fight for first place in the conference.

But in the confrontation with Traktor, everything so far is decided not by the individual skill of individual performers, but by fighting qualities and unity.

They helped the Chelyabinsk team take victory from Ufa, despite the advantage of their opponents.

The hosts missed many chances, and Zach Fucale made 32 saves.

But the guests took advantage of rare moments and frequent deletions in the roster of the Bashkortostan team.

In the 26th minute, Charles Robinson, who had served his suspension, opened the scoring.

In previous games, the legionnaire was more remembered for his fights, but this time he blocked Anton Burdasov’s pass from behind the goal.

True, Viktor Kozlov’s charges quickly managed to restore the status quo.

Moreover, their leading duo of forwards Alexander Khmelevsky and Joshua Livo worked perfectly again.

Both scored their eighth point in the playoffs.

And when “Salavat Yulaev” launched an assault in the final period, the “tractor drivers” carried out a devastating counterattack in a four-on-four format.

Vladimir Tkachev made a tackle in his own half, dragged the puck into the opponent's zone and made a well-timed cross to Maxim Shabanov, who could not miss.