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Olympic Hockey Preview 2006: Kazakhstan
By BRIAN PIKE, MOP Squad Sports Hockey Editor
Feb 18, 2006 - 3:34:00 AM

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2006 Men’s Olympic Hockey Preview: Kazakhstan

2002 Result: Did not qualify for the 2002 Olympics.
Since then: no major international medals.

Lineup:

Players are listed in probable combinations with their NHL city, Russian league team or European club team with country in parentheses.

Forwards (LW-C-RW):
1.    Yevgeny Koreshkov (Ust-Kamenogorsk) – Nikolai Antropov (Toronto) - Andrey Pchelyakov (Krylja Sovetov)
2.    Alexander Koreshkov (Ust-Kamenogorsk) - Andrey Trochshinskiy (Ust-Kamenogorsk) - Andrey Ogorodnikov (Ust-Kamenogorsk)
3.    Fedor Polichshuk (St. Petersburg) - Sergey Alexandrov – (Ust-Kamenogorsk) - Konstantin Shafranov (Krylja Sovetov)
4.    Andrey Samokhvalov (Novgorod) - Dmitriy Upper (CSKA Moscow) - Dmitriy Dudarev (Kazan)

Defensemen:
1.    Vladimir Antipin (Voskresenk) - Artyom Argokov (Novokuznetsk)
2.    Oleg Kovalenko (Ust-Kamenogorsk) - Yevgeniy Pupkov (St. Petersburg)
3.    Alexey Vassilchenko (Niznekamsk) - Denis Shemelin (Niznekamsk)
4.    Alexey Koledayev (Novosibirsk) - Yevgeniy Blokhin (Tver)

Goaltenders:
1.    Vitaly Kolesnik (Colorado)
2.    Vitaly Yeremeyev (Dynamo Moscow)
3.    Kirill Zinovyev (Barys Astana)

Key Player: Nikolai Antropov. Antropov is the easy answer, considering he’s the only player on this roster playing full time in the NHL, but he’ll have to be truly special for Kazakhstan to have a good tournament. Antropov not only provides some much-needed NHL-level talent to this team, at 6’6 and 220 pounds he gives a forward corps on the small side some size. Antropov has been something of an enigma in the NHL; he’s struggled with consistency and finds himself on the fourth line in Toronto as often as on the first. He’s not a natural scorer, but when he drives to the net he’s tough for anyone to stop. He’ll need to be a factor in Turin in order for the Kazakhstan team to have a good showing.

How They’ll Win:

1.    With Kolesnik and Yeremeyev in goal, the Kazakhs have a good tandem that could potentially steal a game for them. When Colorado was having trouble with their starting goalie earlier this season, they called Kolesnik up from their farm team in Lowell of the AHL. He raised a few eyebrows but wasn’t able to sustain a high level of play and was sent down after four games. Still, the 26-year-old has talent, and with all three of Colorado’s goaltenders starting for teams in this tournament (David Aebischer for Switzerland, Peter Budaj for Slovakia) it’ll be interesting to see which one has the best run. Kolesnik will likely split time with Russian League goalie Vitali Yeremeyev, a Ranger draft pick in 1994 who played briefly for their farm team before returning to star for Dynamo Moscow. Yeremeyev is one of only five guys playing in his second Olympics, and his veteran presence in goal should have a calming effect on his team.

2.    While Antropov is the only NHL skater on the roster, he’s not the only dangerous player. Both of the Koreshkovs have been good scorers in the Russian League. Shafronov had a brief cup of coffee with the St. Louis Blues in 1996-97 and put up great numbers in the old International Hockey League. Trochinsky was also a Blues draft pick in 1998 and played two seasons for their AHL team. It’s not a well-known group, but they have some scoring potential.

3.    Kazakhstan’s national team is coming off a very strong 2005 World Championships, and that roster closely resembles this one, with 16 of those players participating here. Kolesnik was excellent in goal and the team played a solid defensive game as the Kazakhs upset Germany, nearly did the same to Switzerland and the Czech Republic, losing by 2-1 and 1-0 scores, respectively, and held hockey powers Russia and Slovakia to identical 3-1 scores. Kazakhstan knows they can play at this level; they belong here, and an upset isn’t out of the question.

How They’ll Lose:

1.    While the team played well defensively at last year’s World Championships, they probably would’ve won more games if they’d scored some goals. Without Antropov, but with both Koreskhovs, Shafranov, and Trochinsky in the lineup, Kazakhstan managed just five goals in four games. Only one guy had more than one point, Dmitir Upper, and the team scored just twice on the power play. Antropov should help, but he’s not a cure-all for offensive woes, and unless Kazakhstan can find some offense from the same guys that couldn’t do it in Austria at last year’s Worlds, they’re going to be in trouble.

2.    While Kazakhstan does have a handful of teams that compete in the Russian Elite League, hockey isn’t an extremely popular sport in the country. It’s more of a regional past-time; a look at the team reveals that almost 90% of the players are from Ust-Kamenogorsk, a region where most of the people are of Russian descent, and not a lot of ethnic Kazakhs actually play the game. Many of the players on this team don’t even speak Kazakh, and it’s one of the oddities of the former Soviet Union that these players of Russian descent have Kazakh nationalities. This isn’t a nation that puts a lot of stock in hockey, and it’s essentially their former place in the USSR that’s allowed them to ice the kind of players they have.

3.    Since 1993, when Kazakhstan began sending their own teams to tournaments after the break-up of the USSR, they’ve participated in the IIHF World Championships every year. They’ve never finished higher than the twelfth they placed last year. Their eighth-place finish at the 1998 Olympics is a bit misleading; after upsetting Slovakia in the preliminary round and winning a spot in the next round-robin with Finland, the Czech Republic, and Russia, Kazakhstan allowed twenty-five goals in three games, while scoring just six of their own. This isn’t a team with a winning tradition; another top-eight finish would be a huge shock.

The Bottom Line: Kazakhstan will be battling Italy for last place in this tournament.


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