KHL - Round Up - September 01, 2017

Happy return for Wolski
Avtomobilist Yekaterinburg 1 Kunlun Red Star 2 (0-0, 0-2, 1-0)
Wojtek Wolski made his first KHL appearance in almost a year after recovering from a horrific neck injury sustained last October when playing for Metallurg Magnitogorsk. Now completely recovered, the Polish-born forward celebrated his return with the winning goal for his new team, Kunlun Red Star.
The big moment came late in the second period, with Red Star already 1-0 up thanks to Brandon Yip’s goal. Wolski peeled away to the back post, Cory Kane fought his way out from behind the net and his backhand fight sat invitingly for Wolski to finish. Avtomobilist, playing its first home game of the season, had to wait until the last seconds before finding the net. Alexei Vasilevsky halved the deficit during a spell of 6-on-5 play, but Kunlun was able to close out the remaining eight seconds and record its second successive victory.

Traktor fightback falls short
Traktor Chelyabinsk 2 Admiral Vladivostok 3 (0-1, 2-1, 0-1)
Vadim Krasnoslobodtsev scored a third-period winner to halt a Traktor revival and set Admiral on course for all three points. The visitor jumped to a 2-0 lead on power play markers from Viktor Alexandrov and Robert Sabolic, but Traktor hit its stride in the latter half of the second period. Two more power play strikes, this times from Paul Szczechura and Artyom Penkovsky, tied the game going into the final session. Traktor looked poised to go on and win it, but Krasnoslobodtsev had other ideas. An awkward bounce stopped the host from clearing its lines, Pavel Makhanovsky intercepted and fed the Kazakh international for the only equal-strength goal of the night. That was enough to separate the teams.

Amur springs surprise in Magnitogorsk
Metallurg Magnitogorsk 2 Amur Khabarovksk 3 (1-2, 0-1, 1-0)
Metallurg slipped to an unexpected defeat at home to Amur as the Far East team got its second victory of the season. It was a former Metallurg player, Bogdan Potekhin, who struck the first blow. He opened the scoring in the fourth minute, claiming his first goal since leaving his native Magnitogorsk over the summer. Vyacheslav Ushenin doubled that lead in the 13^th minute, assisted by his twin brother, but Magnitka responded when 19-year-old Igor Shvyryov got his first ever KHL goal just before the intermission.
Amur continued to press, and Marek Kvapil dinged one off the post early in the second period before Jan Kolar got the eventual game-winner midway through the game. Metallurg was two men down when Maxim Kondratyev shot from the blue line was touched past Vasily Koshechkin by the Czech defenseman.
Nick Schaus pulled a goal back in the third, but Amur held on to record the surprise result of the day. 

Kaprizov strikes to set CSKA on the way to victory
CSKA Moscow 3 Avangard Omsk 0 (1-0, 0-0, 2-0)
Kirill Kaprizov opened the scoring in the second minute with a classic counter-attacking goal. Avangard lost the puck behind the CSKA net, Sergei Shumakov sent Kaprizov bearing down on the net and although Dominik Furch got a piece of the shot, it wasn’t enough to keep it out. But if the 20-year-old forward made the key contribution of the first period, it was another young player, Ilya Sorokin, who played the biggest role in the second. The 22-year-old, like Kaprizov, a Novokuznetsk graduate, made 13 saves in that stanza as Avangard took control of the play. His best came early, denying Pyotr Khokhryakov’s attempt to go short side. CSKA weathered that storm and settled the outcome in the third period. Roman Lyubimov got his first since returning to Moscow, assisted by former Avangard man Anton Burdasov, to make it 2-0. Then Geoff Platt’s empty-netted wrapped it up. Sorokin remained solid at the other end, finishing with 27. saves as the Army Men recorded a fourth straight win.


Ugra edges Vityaz, Varfolomeyev scores twice
Vityaz Podolsk 2 Ugra Khanty-Mansiysk 3 (1-1, 0-1, 1-1)
Two goals from Pavel Varfolomeyev led Ugra to victory at Vityaz in an entertaining game. The visitor, arriving on the back of three straight losses, took an early lead through Sergei Peretyagin, only for Artyom Shvets-Rogovoi to tie it up in the 10^th minute. Varfolomeyev got his first in the 27^th minute but Vityaz again tied the game when Shvets-Rogovoi assisted on Czech D-man Vojtech Mozik’s first KHL goal in the third stanza. Parity lasted a matter of second, though, before Varfolomeyev potted his second of the night to take the points to Ugra. Vityaz thought it had a third equalizer late on, but the video officials ruled that the puck did not cross the line.


When attack is the best form of defense
Slovan Bratislava 2 Sibir Novosibirsk 1 (0-1, 2-0, 0-0)
Slovan recorded its second successive win thanks to a pair of goals from D-man midway through the second period. Andrej Meszaros and Colby Genoway did the damage with two goals in two minutes shortly after the halfway mark.
Earlier, Sibir had led on a ninth-minute goal from Artyom Artyomov, but the host tied the game when Meszaros roofed a wrist shot from the top of the circle. The game was won on a power play seconds later when Genoway went around the back of Alexander Salak’s net and looked to feed Radek Smolenak. The pass never connected: Maxim Ignatovich saw an unlucky deflection off his skate loop up and bounce off the back of his goalie and into the net.
Sibir could not find a way back into the game in the third and was left cursing its luck. Slovan, twice victorious at home, is showing signs of recovery after a slow start to the campaign.