Photo: Championat.ru

Russian sports information agency All Sports, citing information provided by the Moscow Area Ministry of Public Health, is reporting that an analysis of urine taken from Alexei Cherepanov has come back negative for any traces of performance enhancing drugs or metabolites. Testing was performed by the Russian anti-doping laboratory, which holds “the highest category of accreditation by the World Anti-Doping Agency and International Olympic Committee.” Their comprehensive analysis revealed the presence of only an over-the-counter drug called Amexin (internationally known as Tilorone), an immune-enhancing, anti-viral medication used “for preventive maintenance or elimination of inflammation of the mucous membrane.”

Avangard Omsk general manager Anatoli Bardin was not surprised by the news, telling All Sports “I was simply confident that Lesha could not have taken any prohibited drugs. He was a good, honest guy — I had no doubts that he was clean. Thank God that it has now been confirmed by scientific methods. Thanks to everyone who did [the testing] — they’ve dispelled all doubts and put an end to all behind-the-scenes conversations.”

(With thanks to Vlad for his help.)

Photo: Championat.ru

Despite the best efforts of Jaromir Jagr, who scored the Hawks’ first goal and set up their second, Avangard Omsk fell in overtime to division rival Lokomotiv Yaroslavl by a final score of 3-2. The win gave Lokomotiv a one-point lead over Avangard in the Kharlamov Division, with two games in hand.

Goaltender John Grahame spotted the home team as soft a goal as you’ll see when he let a bouncing shot from the center ice red line get past him at 11:00 of the first period. That score stood until the five minute mark of the third period, when Jagr got a stick on a redirected centering pass at the hash marks and beat Lokomotiv goaltender Georgiy Gelashvili high on the stick side.

Omsk where whistled for only two penalties all game, but they paid for both of them. The first came three minutes after they knotted the score at one, and resulted in a 2-1 Loko lead. The Hawks capitalized on their own power play opportunity in the final minutes of the regulation, after Jagr lead a rush into the Yaroslavl zone and dished the puck to Dmitri Pestunov on the left wing, who fed it back to Pavel Rosa on right wing for the tying goal with only 1:13 left to play in regulation.

But Avangard’s second penalty of the game came at 19:37 of the third and carried over into overtime, where the 4-on-3 advantage afforded former Islander Alexei Yashin all the room in the world to walk in to the right face off circle and power a slap shot through Grahame for the game-winner.

The game is available on-demand at Sportbox, or you can get the highlights from the KHL web site. For photos only, see Championat.ru or the KHL.

Prior to the game Avangard winger Alexander Popov was named forward of the week by the KHL for his 4 goal, 2 assist performance in 4 games last week.

Scoring:
11:00 Dimitri Semin (Vasilyev)
45:06 Jaromir Jagr (Pestunov)
49:20 Alexander Guskov (Vasilyev)
58:47 Pavel Rosa (Pestunov, Jagr)
61:39 Alexei Yashin (Guskov)

Avangard Omsk followed up their first match without Alexei Cherepanov with a string of three hard-fought home games last week, taking 5 of a possible 9 standings points.

Dynamo Riga 3 @ Avangard Omsk 2

Avangard fell 2-3 in the first of back-to-back games against Dynamo Riga, as goaltender John Grahame continued to struggle to regain his form after suffering an elbow injury prior to Cherepanov’s death and losing almost a week of practice time in the wake of the tragedy. On the visitors side, former Ranger Marcel Hossa, who leads his team in scoring and is currently tied for 7th in KHL with 13 goals and 7 assists for 20 points, was held scoreless and a was minus-1 while taking 6 minutes in penalties. His former Ranger linemate Jaromir Jagr took a tripping penalty, but also had an assist in a team-leading 22:41 minutes of ice time.

Scoring:
12:16 Mikheilis Redlikhs (Tribuntsov) (watch)
19:59 Alexander Popov (Jagr, Svitov) (watch)
38:26 Phillip Novak (Hartigan) (PP) (watch)
44:30 Alexander Svitov (Klepish, Popov) (watch)
49:13 Alexei Shirokov (Lavinsh) (watch)

Dynamo Riga 0 @ Avangard Omsk 3

Grahame bounced back in a big way, stopping 34 Dynamo shots, and Anton Kuryanov had a hand in all three Omsk goals as the Hawks shut out Dynamo Riga 3-0 in the second of back-to-back games. Jagr had a goal and an assist to extend his point-scoring streak to 8 games as Hossa was once again held off the scoreboard.

Scoring:
05:32 Jaromir Jagr (Ryabikin, Kuryanov) (PP) (watch)
20:36 Anton Kuryanov (Ryazantsev, Rosa) (watch)
53:42 Alexei Bondarev (Kuryanov, Jagr) (watch)

Dynamo Moscow 2 @ Avangard Omsk 3 (SO)

Alexander Popov scored both regulation goals for Avangard, and Pavel Rosa put home the shootout winner as the Hawks defeated Dynamo Moscow the game that was originally scheduled for October 17th, but postponed following Cherpanov’s death. Grahame stopped 38 of 40 shots through regulation and overtime, then — with a little help from his posts — stoned four Dynamo shooters in the shootout. Former Ranger Karel Rachunek had an assist on Dynamo’s first goal.

Scoring:
41:08 Alexander Popov (SH) (watch)
45:28 Denis Denisov (Landry, Rachunek) (watch)
52:04 Igor Emeleev (Kasyanchuk) (watch)
52:35 Alexander Popov (Gladskikh) (watch)

Shootout:
Landry – post (watch)
Alexandrov – save (watch)
Badyukov – save (watch)
Kuryanov – save (watch)
Emeleev – post (watch)
Klepish – save (watch)
Rosa – goal (watch)
Weinhandle – save (watch)

Off the Ice

Off the ice it was announced that Omsk General Manger Anatoli Bardin — who had been given the nod to head the Russian national team at the end of last month — would not be confirmed as the team’s general manager, allowing him to focus instead on his own club in the wake of the Cherepanov tragedy. Meanwhile Cherepanov’s U.S. agent Jay Grossman was in Omsk this week to offer his condolences to the Cherepanov family, according to Soviet Sport, which also noted that Cherepanov’s father Andrei has been given a job within the Avangard organization and that he and his wife will move to Omsk.

As the investigation into the cause of Cherepanov’s death continues, Juri Afonkin, the director of the arena in Chekhov where Cherepanov collapsed, has officially resigned after being disqualified from working within the KHL earlier this week. Director of the Vityaz hockey club, Mikhail Denisov, also banned by the KHL, has also submitted his letter of resignation, though he intends to take the KHL to court over his disqualification, on the premise that he is “not guilty that the ambulance left on a call to rescue a patient three minutes prior to th end of the game.” He claims that any monetary damages he might receive in court will be given to Cherepanov’s family.

The Hawks start a three-game road trip on Monday in Yaroslavl against Kharlamov division rival Lokomotiv, with whom they’re currently battling for first place in the division and a guaranteed playoff berth. The teams are currently tied with 38 points, with Lokomotiv holding 3 games in hand. A dirty little secret — despite the volumes of posts I’ve written about Avangard, they’re not my favorite Russian team. Loko is, due in part to the aforementioned Karel Rachunek, who was the reason I started watching them during the NHL lockout, and kept watching them afterwards, when the rest of the NHLers returned to North America. That said, it’ll be hard not to root for Avangard this season. No matter who wins, tomorrow’s game should be a good one. Lokomotiv will be playing their second game in as many days, but are coming off a 7-1 thrashing of Amur Khabarovsk on Sunday. The best part? The game’s available online starting at 11am 12 noon EDT (damned time change!).