The 2008–09 KHL

season A season is a division of the year based on changes in weather, ecology, and the number of daylight hours in a given region. On Earth, seasons are the result of the axial parallelism of Earth's axial tilt, tilted orbit around the Sun. In temperat ...

was the inaugural season of the Kontinental Hockey League. It started on September 2, 2008, and finished on April 12, 2009. 24 teams each played 56 games.

League business

NHL player transfer

KHL teams signed several players from the NHL, including Jaromír Jágr, Alexander Radulov, Ray Emery, Sergei Brylin,

Ladislav Nagy Ladislav Nagy (; born 1 June 1979) is a Slovak former professional ice hockey player. He played eight seasons as a left winger in the National Hockey League (NHL) with the St. Louis Blues, Phoenix Coyotes, Dallas Stars, and Los Angeles Kings ...

, Jozef Stümpel, Marcel Hossa, Ben Clymer, Alexei Zhitnik, Bryan Berard and Chris Simon.

Dispute

A dispute between the two leagues over some of these signings was supposed to have been resolved by an agreement signed on July 10, whereby each league would honor the contracts of the other, but the signing of Alexander Radulov was made public one day after the agreement (though it was actually signed two days prior to the agreement taking effect), leading to an investigation by the International Ice Hockey Federation.

Finances

Ownership

On a deal dated October 30, Magnitogorsk Iron and Steel Works bought 11.76% of the KHL.

Salary cap

The league has implemented a salary cap.

Economic trouble

Metallurg Novokuznetsk experienced difficulty financing its operations due to the

Great Recession The Great Recession was a period of market decline in economies around the world that occurred from late 2007 to mid-2009.

. Team sponsor Evraz Group was rumoured to cut funding. HC MVD experienced delays in paying players, while Khimik Voskresensk has run itself into debt. Metallurg Magnitogorsk has been forced to cut staff expenditures by 30%.

Avangard Omsk Hockey Club Avangard (, Vanguard), also known as Avangard Omsk, is a professional ice hockey club based in Omsk, Russia. It is a member of the Chernyshev Division in the Kontinental Hockey League (KHL). Franchise history Early years of Omsk hock ...

owner

Roman Abramovich Roman Arkadyevich Abramovich (born 24 October 1966) is a business oligarch and politician. He is the former owner of Chelsea F.C., Chelsea, a Premier League football club in London, England, and is the primary owner of the private investment com ...

has promised to continue financial support so long as the team maintains good results. Other teams experiencing financial limitations are Vityaz Chekhov, Atlant Moscow Oblast, Lokomotiv Yaroslavl,

HC CSKA Moscow HC CSKA Moscow (, ''Central Sports Club of the Army, Moscow'') is a professional ice hockey club based in Moscow, Russia. It is a member of the Tarasov Division in the Kontinental Hockey League (KHL). It is referred to in the West as "Central R ...

. As far as the league is concerned it has devised a "crisis package" for dealing with the economic turmoil. Cuts will be made to non-salary expenditures, such as pre-game activity, training camps, and elimination of pre-season tournaments. Mid-level player salaries may also be rolled back. Divisional re-alignment will also take place for the 2009–10 season to cut down on travel costs.

Inaugural All-Star Game

The inaugural KHL All-Star Game took place on January 10, 2009. Each team consisted of ten forwards, five defensemen, and two goaltenders. The starting rosters were voted upon on the KHL.ru website and decided by December 22. The secondary lines and goaltenders were to be voted upon by the media, and announced December 26, with the following players and reserves announced by January 8. The game took place in Moscow's Red Square, with Team Jágr (International All-Stars) defeating Team Yashin (Russian All-Stars) 7–6.

Regular season

Death of Alexei Cherepanov

On October 13, 2008 during a match between

and Vityaz Chekhov, forward Alexei Cherepanov died due to a heart condition. On December 29, 2008, Russian investigators revealed that he suffered from

myocarditis Myocarditis is inflammation of the cardiac muscle. Myocarditis can progress to inflammatory cardiomyopathy when there is associated ventricular remodeling and cardiac dysfunction due to chronic inflammation. Symptoms can include shortness of bre ...

, a condition where not enough blood gets to the heart, and that he should not have been playing professional hockey. The federal Investigative Committee also announced that a

chemical analysis Analytical chemistry studies and uses instruments and methods to separate, identify, and quantify matter. In practice, separation, identification or quantification may constitute the entire analysis or be combined with another method. Separa ...

of Cherepanov's blood and urine samples allowed experts to conclude "that for several months Alexei Cherepanov engaged in doping". Official sources have stated the banned substance taken was nikethamide, a

stimulant Stimulants (also known as central nervous system stimulants, or psychostimulants, or colloquially as uppers) are a class of drugs that increase alertness. They are used for various purposes, such as enhancing attention, motivation, cognition, ...

, and that it had been taken 3 hours prior to the game in which he died.

Omsk Omsk (; , ) is the administrative center and largest types of inhabited localities in Russia, city of Omsk Oblast, Russia. It is situated in southwestern Siberia and has a population of over one million. Omsk is the third List of cities and tow ...

club director Mikhail Denisov has since been fired, whereas the league Disciplinary Committee has since removed Omsk's doctors from that role with the club, and has suspended Avangard general manager Anatoly Bardin and team president Konstantin Potapov. The KHL Disciplinary Committee met on this matter on January 5, and also suspended Chekhov's team president.

League standings

Final standings. Points have been awarded as follows: *3 Points for a win in regulation ("W") *2 Points for a win in overtime ("OTW") or penalty shootout ("SOW") *1 Point for a loss in a penalty shootout ("SOL") or overtime ("OTL") *0 Points for a loss in regulation ("L")

Divisional standing

League leaders

Goaltenders: minimum 15 games played

Scoring leaders

''GP = Games played; G = Goals; A = Assists; Pts = Points; +/– = P Plus–minus; PIM = Penalty minutes''

Playoffs

Playoff leaders

Source: khl.ru Goaltenders: minimum 5 games played

Scoring leaders

Source: khl.ru ''GP = Games played; G = Goals; A = Assists; Pts = Points; +/– = P Plus–minus; PIM = Penalty minutes''

Leading goaltenders

Source: khl.ru ''GP = Games played; Min = Minutes played; W = Wins; L = Losses; GA = Goals against; SO = Shutouts; SV% =

Save percentage Save percentage (often known by such symbols as SV%, SVS%, SVP, PCT) is a statistic in various Goal (sports), goal-scoring sports that track Save (goaltender), saves as a statistic. In ice hockey and lacrosse and association football, it is a sta ...

; GAA = Goals against average''

Awards

Players of the Month

Best KHL players of each month.

KHL Awards

On 15 May 2009, the KHL held their first award ceremony. A total of 23 different awards were handed out to teams, players, officials and media.Kontinental Hockey League Awarded Laureates Of 2008/2009 Season
khl.ru, 2009-05-15. Accessed 2009-06-20.
Archived
2009-06-22. The most important trophies are listed in the table below.

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:2008-09 KHL season Kontinental Hockey League seasons 1 1