Hockey highlights in July? And relevant to the Colorado Avalanche? What exactly is going on? Well, a charity match between KHL All-Stars and NHL All-Stars, to be exact.
On Saturday, a charity game mixing the two leagues came together, thanks in large part to Utah’s Mikhail Sergachev and New York‘s Artremi Panarin. Both helped set up the match and sponsored it through their foundations.
Those two obviously suited up for the NHL team, but on the KHL squad was Colorado Avalanche prospect Ilya Nabokov. The 21 year old got into the net in the third period, and helped keep his team close in order for them to hang on and tie the game up. The match ended in an 8-8 tie and Nabokov gave up just one goal, which came on a penalty shot attempt from St. Louis Blues forward Pavel Buchnevich.
We’ve had a lot of Nabokov content lately, because quite frankly there isn’t much else to talk about. After the game, he spoke to reporters about meeting Sergei Bobrovsky and also about when he might arrive in the NHL. I’ll have more on that tomorrow. In the meantime, here are some of his top moments from the game. Like most All-Star games, there wasn’t much defense being played, and any penalty immediately led to a penalty shot. After the game ended, the two sides completed a quick shootout, but no winner was decided.
What you’ll see in the highlights is Nabokov making life very difficult for Artemi Panarin, who is coming off a 120 point season in the NHL. The first two clips are of Nabokov stoning Panarin on a penalty shot, with the second of the two clips being a replay. He does it again a few other times inside the game and then gets the best of the Rangers star in the shootout. You’ll also see Nabokov make a few nice stops on Columbus forward Kirill Marchenko.
This is as good as we’ll get for July hockey highlights, so enjoy.
