{"id":166723,"date":"2025-08-21T19:38:19","date_gmt":"2025-08-21T19:38:19","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/166723\/"},"modified":"2025-08-21T19:38:19","modified_gmt":"2025-08-21T19:38:19","slug":"islanders-in-early-on-young-russian-standout-maxim-shabanov","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/166723\/","title":{"rendered":"Islanders in early on young Russian standout Maxim Shabanov"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>Maxim Tsyplakov may not be the last Russian import the Islanders consider.\u00a0<\/p>\n<p>The Islanders are one of four teams so far to ask after Traktor Chelyabinsk forward Maxim Shabanov, The Post has learned, with the Maple Leafs, Predators and Utah being the others.\u00a0<\/p>\n<p>It is quite early in the sweepstakes for Shabanov, who scored 25 goals and 25 assists in the KHL last season and has 14 points in 12 games so far this season. <\/p>\n<p><img style=\"aspect-ratio:1.49926794;display:block\" fetchpriority=\"high\" decoding=\"async\" data-modal-image=\"33527692\" width=\"885\" height=\"590\" src=\"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/08\/GettyImages-1773593723.jpg\" alt=\"The Islanders are one of four teams in early on Maxim Shabanov.\" class=\"wp-image-33527692\"  \/>The Islanders are one of four teams in early on Maxim Shabanov. SOPA Images\/LightRocket via Gett<\/p>\n<p>At this stage, these are only conversations \u2014 there have been no meetings as of yet and no American scouts have made the trip to see Shabanov in person, per a source.\u00a0<\/p>\n<p>Like with Tsyplakov, the expectation is that Shabanov\u2019s suitors will eventually grow to 10-12 teams in total by the end of the season, when he is expected to make a decision.\u00a0<\/p>\n<p>The 24-year-old Shabanov is listed as having played both wing and center, and has spent the entirety of his four KHL seasons thus far with Chelyabinsk, located south of Yekaterinburg in central Russia.\u00a0<\/p>\n<p>The presence of European scouting whisperer Jim Paliafito, who helped land Tsyplakov, could help the Islanders with Shabanov as well.\u00a0<\/p>\n<p>Tsyplakov, who chose the Islanders over a number of other teams last spring, is likely to <a href=\"https:\/\/nypost.com\/2024\/10\/02\/sports\/islanders-maxim-tsyplakov-ably-bridging-communication-gap\/\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">start the season in the top six<\/a> after a standout camp in which he beat out Pierre Engvall to play alongside Brock Nelson and Kyle Palmieri.\u00a0<\/p>\n<p><img style=\"aspect-ratio:1.49926794;display:block\" loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" data-modal-image=\"33527705\" width=\"885\" height=\"590\" src=\"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/08\/GettyImages-1841804556.jpg\" alt=\"Maxim Shabanov is expected to make a decision next year.\" class=\"wp-image-33527705\"  \/>Maxim Shabanov is expected to make a decision next year. SOPA Images\/LightRocket via Gett<\/p>\n<p>If he can <a href=\"https:\/\/nypost.com\/2024\/09\/23\/sports\/islanders-maxim-tsyplakov-shakes-off-rocky-start-gives-glimpse-of-skills\/\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">replicate the 31-goal campaign<\/a> he produced with Spartak Moscow last season \u2014 or even come close \u2014 it would be a major boon to the Islanders, who have been short on scoring for years.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Maxim Tsyplakov may not be the last Russian import the Islanders consider.\u00a0 The Islanders are one of four&hellip;\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":166724,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[5110],"tags":[12962,5,122,3328,159,5190,5189,4,43],"class_list":{"0":"post-166723","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-new-york-islanders","8":"tag-exclusive","9":"tag-hockey","10":"tag-islanders","11":"tag-new-york","12":"tag-new-york-islanders","13":"tag-newyork","14":"tag-newyorkislanders","15":"tag-nhl","16":"tag-sports"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/channels.im\/@nhl\/115068451141870612","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/166723","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=166723"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/166723\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/166724"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=166723"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=166723"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=166723"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}