"The goal into the empty net of Traktor was like slow motion for me"

Last week, Lokomotiv Yaroslavl's hockey players won the Gagarin Cup, the first in the club's history. In the final, they won the series against Traktor Chelyabinsk (4:1) after five matches, and before that Torpedo Nizhny Novgorod (4:0), Avangard Omsk (4:3) and Salavat Yulaev Ufa (4:1) went through to the KHL playoffs. The success of the "railwaymen" is also unique due to the presence in the main clip of the winning team of 17 pupils of the club, eight of whom are natives of Yaroslavl. Among them is striker Denis Alekseev, who came to the city at the age of 12.

In an interview with Izvestia, he shared his first emotions after Maxim Shalunov's decisive goal in overtime of the fifth match of the final against Traktor (2:1), spoke about the importance of victory in memory of the players, coaches and employees of Lokomotiv who died in a plane crash on September 7, 2011, and also explained why The team's head coach Igor Nikitin and his assistant Dmitry Yushkevich made Yaroslavtsev the strongest in the KHL.

— What emotions did you feel after winning the Gagarin Cup?

— In the first minutes after Max Shalunov's winning goal, I couldn't believe, to be honest, that we had finally won the Gagarin Cup. And then I felt great happiness from taking this trophy.

— Your goal into the empty net of Traktor at the end of the fourth match became one of the key goals in the final series, considering that Byron Fraz had received a five-minute suspension before that, and if Chelyabinsk had equalized the score at the end of regular time, he would have played more than four minutes in overtime.

— It's hard to say anything about that episode. For me, everything happened very quickly, like in slow motion. But the main thing is victory. It was important that, as a result of that meeting, we left Chelyabinsk with two wins and a score of 3:1 in the series. That's why each of us worked in training and on the ice to help the team at the right moment.

— How did Lokomotiv improve compared to the final they lost to Metallurg a year ago?

— In small things, mostly. In principle, we had a good team back then. It just wasn't enough to take the trophy. But this season, everyone was again as focused as possible on winning and reached the end.

— How important was it for the students of Lokomotiv, who come from Yaroslavl or moved to the city as children, like you, to bring a trophy in memory of the team that died in 2011?

— I think that not only the local guys were burning with this goal. We at Lokomotiv do not divide the team into locals and non-locals. We have the same team. And everyone understood perfectly well that it was necessary to win in memory of that team. And I'm speechless when I realize that we've done it.

— What did Igor Nikitin and Dmitry Yushkevich bring to the team when they joined it in the fall of 2021?

— First of all, they made each of us believe in ourselves. We did everything we could to succeed. And the coaches pushed us, encouraged us and believed in the team from the very beginning.

— How did you see the state of your goalkeeper Daniil Isaev from the inside after, before the final series, Traktor head coach Benoit Groux said that Lokomotiv's defense was flawless, but he couldn't say the same about the goalkeeper, and connected the fact that you almost lost the series to Avangard with his game"?

— Danya is a professional. He handled everything. There is nothing to add here.

"Winning the Gagarin Cup is a tribute to the 2011 team"

Mikhail Evraev, Governor of the Yaroslavl Region, spoke about Lokomotiv's triumph in the KHL playoffs, the local arena and the club's president, Yuri Yakovlev.

— Does Lokomotiv have a chance to stay at the top next season?

— I don't even know what to say. The main thing is that we are at the top now. What will happen tomorrow... We'll discuss it later. We have professionals in our team and we are always ready to play to win.

— What are your impressions of playing with Alexander Radulov in the same team?

— It was a tremendous experience to play a whole season with Radulov in the same team. Every training session with him, every match, you just learn from him every day. He plays every moment to the end — it doesn't matter if it's in an official match, in a pre-season game or in training.