Montreal Canadiens’ prospect Ivan Demidov started his season with SKA St. Petersburg in the KHL and can be proud of his performance. The youngster had said not so long ago that he was considered the 13th forward on the team but after a convincing performance at the Puchkov tournament with the U-23 national team, he earned a spot on the opening day roster.
In a 5-4 overtime loss, the winger saw just over 14 minutes of ice time and made the most of it. He recorded a primary assist on the first goal of the game, a power play tally and got a plus-one rating as he was on the ice as Evgeny Kuznetsov scored in the second period.
He also showed off some serious skills taking the puck coast-to-coast but was stopped on his backhand by Metallurg goaltender Ilya Nabokov, who was the KHL Playoffs’ MVP last season.
At the final buzzer, Demidov had a total of three shots and one hit as well. It’s safe to say that it was a good outing by the young Russian. SKA will be back in action on Saturday when they take on Lada at 2:30 PM local time (7:30 AM in Montreal).
It will be interesting to see if he starts the next game alongside Kuznetsov, his performance must have given coach Roman Rotenberg something to think about. It’s hard not to think we’ll have plenty of highlights to feast our eyes on this season.
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