(Photo: Ilya Smirnov / photo.khl.ru)
By: Patrick Donnelly | Follow me on Twitter @PatDonn12
Former Boston Bruins prospect Alexander Khokhlachev has been traded in a one-for-one swap in the Kontinental Hockey League. The 26-year-old was dealt from Spartak Moscow to Avangard Omsk in exchange for forward Sergei Shirokov.
This season with Spartak, Khokhlachev posted 14 goals and 18 assists for 32 points in 56 games in addition to 2-3-5 numbers in six playoff contests. Through four seasons in the KHL, the Moscow native has 56-73-129 totals in 187 games to go along with two goals, six helpers, and eight points in 25 playoff games.
Selected 40th overall by Boston in the second round of the 2011 National Hockey League Entry Draft, Khokhlachev departed North American hockey after the 2015-16 campaign, where he tallied 23-45-68 totals in 60 American Hockey League contests with the Providence Bruins. The Russian was a prolific scorer at the AHL level with 61 goals and 110 assists for 171 points in 197 AHL contests under Bruins head coach Bruce Cassidy, who apparently has a strong relationship with “Koko.”
The five-foot-11, 187-pound forward could not seem to get his success to translate to the NHL: zero points in nine games with a minus-four rating. When Khokhlachev got looks with the big club, former Boston head coach Claude Julien fed him limited ice time.
During the 2017-18 season, Elliotte Friedman of Sportsnet and Hockey Night in Canada reported that a return to Boston could be in the fold for Khokhlachev, and according to Mark Divver, team representatives met him overseas that winter to “talk things over.”
At the time, Bruins general manager Don Sweeney even acknowledged that Khokhlachev “indicated to us originally during the year that he was interested [in returning to Boston].” However, it seems fair to say that a return is probably not imminent at this point in time.
The Bruins hold Khokhlachev’s NHL rights until he is 27 years old, so long as the team submits a qualifying offer each year. Khokhlachev will turn 27 on September 9, 2020.
Check out the new Black N’ Gold Hockey Podcast episode 176 that we recorded below on 4-27-20! You can find our show on many worldwide platforms such as Apple Podcasts, Google Podcasts, iHeart Radio, Spotify, SoundCloud, and Stitcher.
[soundcloud url=”https://api.soundcloud.com/tracks/808593082″ params=”auto_play=false&hide_related=false&visual=true&show_comments=true&show_user=true&show_reposts=false&color=ff5500″ width=”100%” height=”450″ iframe=”true” /]
Leave a Reply