KHL 2017-2018 is a real holiday for all fans of Russian and European hockey. Every year this elite tournament attracts the attention of tens of millions of fans and sports observers. However, the KHL is not only bright and spectacular matches. Often, the epicness of ice battles depends on coaches and breeders, thanks to whom the Continental Hockey League is one of the strongest championships in the world.
| CONTENT |
Games calendar
The next draw of the Continental Hockey League will be anniversary. The first round of the tenth championship starts on August 21, 2017. Last match league will be played in mid-February 2018.
Main hockey tournament Russia will be attended by 27 professional clubs, which will take to the ice 56 times during the season.
According to the championship regulations, two teams will leave the Major Hockey League standings, which, following the results of the KHL 2016-2017, showed worst results. The list of last season's losers included Metallurg Novokuznetsk and Medvescak from Zagreb.
It is worth recalling that the future championship will be a kind of preparation for the Olympic tournament, which will be held in South Korea in February 2018. Thus, the schedule of regular season matches and the schedule of playoff games will be drawn up taking into account the start of the Winter Olympics.
In addition, the calendar will contain 10-day breaks related to the preparation of the national teams for the Eurotour and the World Cup.
The playoffs will take place in March and April. February will be excluded from the schedule due to participation national teams in OI.
What changes are expected in the season 2017 - 2018?
How do you know 
Obviously, in May 2017, a new strategy for the development of the Continental Hockey League was approved, designed for 5 years. According to the adopted regulations, in the 2018-2019 season, the number of teams will be reduced to 24, and starting from the 2019-2020 season, the two clubs that left the league will be replaced by foreign teams. The replacement will be carried out in accordance with the rating of teams based on the results of the games of the previous three seasons. In addition, factors such as sports achivments and player fees.
The playoffs will feature 8 clubs from the Western and Eastern conferences. Pairs of the first round will be determined according to the formula “the strongest with the weakest”:
- the second from the seventh;
- third from sixth;
- fourth with fifth.
Each round of playoff matches will last up to four victories for one of the teams. The two best clubs will fight in the final for the title of champion of the Kontinental Hockey League.
Leaderboard
The championship is attended by professional hockey clubs representing two conferences - Western and Eastern.
The Western Conference standings for the 2017-2018 season are as follows:
- Vityaz (Podolsk);
- Dynamo (Moscow);
- Dynamo (Minsk);
- Dynamo (Riga);
- Jokerite (Helsinki);
- Lokomotiv (Yaroslavl);
- Severstal (Cherepovets);
- SKA (St. Petersburg);
- Slovan (Bratislava);
- Spartak Moscow);
- Torpedo (Nizhny Novgorod);
- HC Sochi (Krasnodar Territory);
- CSKA (Moscow).
The Eastern Conference standings include the following teams:
- Vanguard (Omsk);
- Motorist (Yekaterinburg);
- Admiral (Vladivostok);
- AK Bars (Kazan);
- Amur (Khabarovsk);
- Barys (Astana);
- Kunlun Red Star (Beijing);
- Lada (Tolyatti);
- Metallurgist (Magnitogorsk);
- Neftekhimik (Nizhnekamsk);
- Salavat Yulaev (Ufa);
- Siberia (Novosibirsk);
- Tractor (Chelyabinsk);
- Yugra (Khanty-Mansiysk).
Transfer market KHL 2017 - 2018
Thanks to transfer transitions many clubs have the opportunity to strengthen their squads and significantly increase the chances of success in the fight for gold medals. Agents of the leading teams of the Continental Hockey League have already managed to acquire promising players who are ready to make every effort to win their team in the championship. Particularly noteworthy are the transfers made by last season's leaders - CSKA Moscow and Metallurg Magnitogorsk.
In the off-season, the capital club lost almost half of the main team. The club left such stars of domestic and world hockey as Alexander Radulov, Nikita Zaitsev, Maxim Tretyak, Antti Pilstrem and many other famous players. However, the work of CSKA breeders deserves the highest marks. The hockey players who left the team were replaced by young and promising masters: Maxim Shalunov, Konstantin Okulo and Sergey Shumakov from the Novosibirsk “Siberia”, as well as Kirill Kaprizov from “Salavat Yulaev” and Henrik Temmernes from the Swedish “Frelund”.
Unlike their Moscow opponents, the club from Magnitogorsk did not suffer such significant losses. However, the coaching staff of the club also cannot boast of high-profile acquisitions. On the eve of the new season, the Metallurg roster was replenished with only three players: Dmitry and Denis Kazionov from HC Sochi and Ilya Berestennikov from Angarsk Yermak.
coming KHL season 2017 - 2018 promises to be very interesting. First, a new draw Continental League will be anniversary - it will be held for the 10th time in a row! Therefore, the organizers certainly prepared special events in honor of such an event. Secondly, the schedule of the tournament will be greatly redrawn. Blame it all on the Winter Olympics in Pyeongchang, Korea. And a number of sources are actively spreading rumors about new clubs that can join the ranks of the championship participants: the Estonian Ilves, the Swedish Crowns and some so far unknown club from ... Great Britain!
Schedule KHL 2017/2018
The championship starts on August 21, 2017 and finishes in April next year. The established calendar will be significantly changed due to the Olympics, which will be held in the Korean city of Pyeongchang on February 9-25, 2018. Therefore, the HC leagues will not play for almost the entire February. Here is the approximate schedule for the upcoming edition of the championship:
- August 21, 2017 - early February 2018: regular season;
- early March - April: Gagarin Cup playoffs 2018.
Also, the season calendar will include short breaks due to the stages of the Euro Hockey Tour 2017/2018.
Championship teams
In total, at least 28 clubs will compete for the Gagarin Cup in the future edition of the tournament. The most serious hockey masters of the Continental League 2017/2018 will again represent Western conference. Here is their list:
- "Dynamo" (Minsk);
- Dynamo (Riga);
- "Jokerite";
- "SKA";
- "Slovan";
- "Spartacus";
- "Knight";
- Dynamo (Moscow);
- "Locomotive";
- "Severstal";
- "Sochi";
- "Torpedo";
- "CSKA".
The Eastern Conference is not so rich in big names. But the finalist of the last KHL draw, Metallurg Magnitogorsk, plays there. And this conference is the most Russian. If 4 “foreign” teams play in the West (there were 5), then in the East 13 out of 15 KHL hockey teams from Russia. In the upcoming draw, this conference will be represented by the following clubs:
- "Motorist";
- "AK Bars";
- "Lada";
- "Metallurg" (Magnitogorsk);
- "Neftekhimik";
- "Tractor";
- "Yugra";
- "Vanguard";
- "Admiral";
- "Amur";
- "Barys";
- "Metallurg" (Novokuznetsk);
- "Salavat Yulaev";
- "Siberia";
- Kun Lun Red Star.
Tournament novelties
In the tournament KHL table season 2017 - 2018 fans will no longer see HC Medvescak. The Croatians left the championship, unable to cope with the financial burden. From next season, the club will again play in the Austrian League.
Croats should be replaced by one or even several teams. So far, sources of varying degrees of reliability are wooing three teams into the championship.
« Ilves»
An ambitious project of Estonian businessmen. The organizers intend to create a team with stable funding and a good line-up. According to plans, the club was supposed to appear in the KHL in 2016. However, the team remained on paper. If everything “grows together” this time, then Ilves will become the first Estonian team in the league!
« crowns»
Another interesting project. The club, created in 2016, by hook or by crook is striving to get into the KHL. However, the local federation does not want to let the HC go. Perhaps the Crowns will still be able to persuade the Swedish officials, and hockey fans will soon see the Stockholm team in the regular season of the Continental Championship 2017/2018!
« Malmö Redhawks»
Another Swedish team experiencing similar problems with the Crowns. Negotiations about joining the league have been going on for several years. But the Swedish Ice Hockey Federation remains adamant in its decision.
« Stavanger Oilers" and " Valerenga»
Two super clubs of the Norwegian style. Teams want to leave their native land to try their hand at stronger tournaments. It is possible that the KHL will become a new step for them.
HC from UK
In the coming years, the Continental Championship may increase due to HC from Foggy Albion. The British themselves are showing interest in the tournament. It is assumed that the future club will be based in London. If this happens, the KHL can significantly increase its audience due to hockey fans from Western Europe!
Afterword
Yes, the preliminary information about the new draw is intriguing! If new teams appear in the championship, then the standings, schedule and results of KHL 2017-2018 matches will be increased attention. But even without newcomers, the competition will remain one of the strongest and most spectacular hockey leagues in the world, second only to the overseas NHL!
There is very little time left before the start of the 2018-2019 KHL season, and millions of hockey fans are looking forward to the start of the championship. The current draw promises a lot of interesting things, including matches on outdoors and expansion of Internet broadcasts. In addition, solid financial injections into the teams of the Eastern Conference (Avangard, AK Bars, Salavat Yulaev) should put an end to hegemony Western clubs in the Gagarin Cup. All this will make the tournament even more spectacular, unpredictable and attractive to fans.
Regular season calendar
KHL schedule The leadership of the league promised to present 2018-2019 on June 15, but the final version was drawn up only by the beginning of July. The reason for the transfer was the move of CSKA to the arena to Spartak, as a result of which at least one day of break is set between the home matches of these teams. This is the minimum amount of time required to fill the ice and prepare the arena for play. According to the league bosses, almost all the wishes of the tournament participants were taken into account, as well as the interests of the national team in preparation for the World Cup. As a result, I had to tinker with the schedule, because it is still compiled manually.
The start of the 2018-2019 KHL season will take place on September 1 at the Kazan Arena. The winner of the Gagarin Cup AK Bars Kazan and the Continental Cup winner SKA St. Petersburg will meet in the opening match. The next day, the regular championship starts, which will last until February 22. Each team in the league will play 62 matches, which will determine 16 top clubs- playoff participants. Among the main innovations of the 2018-2019 KHL calendar, we note:
- September 7 will now become a match day (earlier matches on this day were not held due to the tragedy of HC Lokomotiv);
- the KHL All-Star Game will take place in Kazan from 18 to 20 January and will include a competition day along with a divisional tournament;
- on the ice arenas Western Europe in Vienna and Zurich will be held match "Slovan" - "CSKA" and "CSKA" - "Dinamo" (Riga);
- On January 20, Riga will host the second open-air match in the history of the league, in which the local Dynamo will face Jokerit or Slovan.
The 2018-2019 KHL season will end no later than April 25. On this day, the seventh match of the final series between the best clubs in the Western and Eastern conferences will take place, if necessary. As a result, the wishes of the FHR were realized, which requested at least two weeks of preparation for the national team for the upcoming one. There have been many discussions about keeping 7 September as a free day from KHL matches, but in a busy schedule, every date counts. Nevertheless, all the teams that will take to the ice on September 7 will play with mourning ribbons in memory of the Lokomotiv hockey players who died in the plane crash.
Not without "overlays"
The KHL match schedule for the 2018-2019 season provides for a number of breaks in accordance with the IIHF calendar. Among them are breaks in games:
- November 8-11 (Eurotrip in Finland);
- December 13-16 (Eurotour in Russia);
- February 7-10 (Eurotrip in Sweden).
The leadership of the KHL acted on principle and did not cancel the big game day on November 12th. Given the fact that on the eve of the 11th the Russian team will play its match in Helsinki, not all players will be able to arrive at the location of their clubs. And if you can fly to Moscow or St. Petersburg overnight, then, for example, to Omsk, Kazan or Cherepovets, this is unlikely to be done. As a result, the coaches of a number of teams will have to puzzle over starting lineup 11th of November.
Who will take part in the championship?
They will play in the 2018-2019 KHL, which will play at least two matches with the rest of the participants (on their own ice and in the opponent's arena). In addition, the clubs will play two more matches each within their own division and two games each with randomly selected opponents from other divisions. After the exclusion of Lada and Yugra from the current KHL draw, the composition of the league participants looks like this:
Eastern Conference | Western Conference |
"Motorist" | Dynamo (Moscow) |
"AK Bars" | Dynamo (Riga) |
"Metallurgist" | "Jokerite" |
"Neftekhimik" | |
"Torpedo" | Severstal |
"Tractor" | "Spartacus" |
"Vanguard" | "Knight" |
"Admiral" | Dynamo (Minsk) |
"Locomotive" |
|
"Slovan" |
|
"Salavat Yulaev" | |
"Siberia" | |
"Kunlun" |
Torpedo was transferred to the Eastern Conference, the question of whose participation was acute before the start of the 2018-2019 KHL. Luckily for the local fans, the team's bosses found financial reserves, almost completely repaying the wage arrears to the players. Clubs "Dinamo" (Minsk) and "Slovan" were transferred to the Tarasov division, and their places in the Bobrov division were taken by Dynamo Moscow and Severstal.
Tournament Regulations
The 2018-2019 KHL Championship has not undergone major changes. still standings Leagues will be formed based on points scored in matches. For a win in regulation time (over three periods) 3 points will be awarded. If the match is won in extra time or by a shootout, then the winner is awarded 2 points, and the losing team is awarded 1 point. This is the main difference between the tournament and the NHL, where changes were introduced last year: a team is now awarded two points for a victory, including if it is won in extra time. The team that loses in extra time is awarded 1 point.
8 go to the playoffs of the Gagarin Cup the best teams from each conference. Pairs are formed according to the “cross-wise” principle, that is, the first squad will play from the eighth, the second - from the seventh, etc. Elimination games are held up to four victories in the series of one of the clubs, and if a draw is recorded in the match after three periods , a 10-minute overtime is assigned to the first goal scored. In the final series for the Gagarin Cup, the best hockey teams of the "West" and "East" will meet.
The 2018-2019 KHL calendar provides for a huge number of matches that will take place in a fierce struggle. During the tournament, the audience will see a lot of spectacular moments, power moves and pucks. The level of the league has grown significantly in recent years, and the current draw will not be an exception. We are expecting 151 game days, 775 meetings, L, exhibition matches of the best league clubs in Europe, open-air ice battles in Riga. Don't miss the start of the 2018-2019 KHL, which kicks off on September 1st.
The best goals of the KHL regular season 2017-2018, see the following video:
KHL championship match results
All amateurs can expect an exciting and lengthy championship, which will include a large number of fights. Therefore, just by the way, the site results option will be last round KHL championship, thanks to which any user can be aware of the score of absolutely every match. Fans coming soon KHL clubs will applaud their favorites, who will do their best to ensure that the results of the KHL championship matches are purely positive.Starts on August 21, 2017 in St. Petersburg with a match for the Opening Cup between the winner of the Gagarin Cup SKA and the winner of the regular season of the 2016/2017 season CSKA. The first stage of the championship will end on March 1, 2018 and will last 193 calendar days (of which 145 are gaming days).
The second stage of the championship will begin on March 3 for the West conference teams and on March 4 for the East clubs.
Each of the 27 participating teams will play 56 matches in the first stage. The schedule includes breaks scheduled, according to the IIHF international calendar, for the stages of the Eurotour in Finland (November 7-11) and Russia (December 13-17), as well as winter Olympic Games 2018 (February 9-25). The calendar provides for a break related to the preparation of the Russian team for the Olympics (January 24 - February 8).
Pauses are planned for the Week of Hockey Stars 2018 in Astana (January 12-15), as well as a break for the New Year holidays (December 31 - January 2). Traditionally, there will be no games on September 7 on Lokomotiv's memorial day.
The calendar for the 2017/18 season has a number of advantages over the schedules of other KHL "Olympic" seasons. The number of days without matches will be minimal - 48 (in the 2009/10 season - 56, in the 2013/2014 season - 61). The minimum (8) will be the number of days without matches for reasons not related to the official international breaks of the IIHF (in the seasons 2009/2010 and 2013/2014 - 16 each). On average, there will be 5.21 matches per game day (in the 2009/2010 season - 5.46, in the 2013/2014 season - 6.25).
The rhythm of the calendar will allow broadcasters to show and viewers to see more matches live.
Georgy Kobylyansky, KHL Vice President for Hockey Operations:
Our specialists have done a great and fruitful work. current season- very intense, it will accommodate several large international hockey competitions, the main of which is the Olympics. It was a very difficult task to create a calendar that would take into account the interests of the Russian national team and KHL clubs as much as possible. However, I think it succeeded. The calendar turned out to be rhythmic and balanced, as far as the conditions that we had to comply with allowed it. The work was carried out in close cooperation with the Russian Hockey Federation, we held several consultations and eventually came to the version of the calendar that was presented today. I am sure that the tenth anniversary season of the KHL will be interesting and will give pleasure to all hockey fans.