IHF “Salavat superior again: KHL regular season winners want to erase last year’s failure”, March 10, 2010
They captured the KHL regular season title for the second year in a row. But it’s not the time for celebration. There’s much work to do.
Memories of last year’s failure immediately pop up in people’s mind. Salavat Yulayev Ufa faced a hard reality check in the first round of the playoffs when the top seed was eliminated in the first round by 16th-seeded Avangard Omsk….
They clinched a playoff spot on the very last day of the regular season and that is already more than it was expected from Sykora’s squad. The difference in quality however can be illustrated by the fact that Salavat Yulayev’s Alexander Radulov and Patrick Thoresen almost had as many goals, 24, as Avtomobilist’s top scorer Alexander Gulyavtsev had points, 28.
Additional Reading: http://www.iihf.com/nc/home-of-hockey/news/news-singleview/article/salavat-superior-again.html