Evgeny Kuznetsov had a scary moment during Sunday\u2019s KHL playoff game between his Salavat Yulaev and Lokomotiv Yaroslavl.<\/p>\n
After advancing the puck over Lokomotiv\u2019s blueline, Kuznetsov took a hit from forward Alexander Polunin. The former Washington Capitals<\/a> center was not expecting to be hit and fell hard to the ice along the boards.<\/p>\n Kuznetsov was unable to get off the ice under his own power and was placed on a stretcher that was wheeled out through the Zamboni entrance door. He left the game just 13 minutes into the first period, giving a thumbs-up to the crowd as he departed.<\/p>\n Polunin did not receive any penalties from the on-ice officials for the hit. He could be seen on the bench, shaking his head at the unfortunate situation.<\/p>\n Thankfully, it appears Kuznetsov escaped serious injury, as he eventually reappeared in his street clothes to watch the rest of the game from behind the glass.<\/p>\n \u201cI spoke to him, everything seems fine,\u201d Kuznetsov\u2019s agent Shumi Babaev told Sport-Express\u2019 Alexander Abustin postgame<\/a>, as translated via Google Translate. \u201cEverything worked out.\u201d<\/p>\n Lokomotiv ended up winning the game 3-2, taking a 3-0 lead over Salavat in their second-round series. They are the defending Gagarin Cup champions and finished as the number-one seed in the KHL\u2019s Western Conference.<\/p>\n Kuznetsov has recorded two points (1g) in six playoff games after posting 18 points (6g, 12a) in 19 games for Salavat during the regular season.<\/p>\n \u201cWe\u2019ll fight to the end,\u201d Kuznetsov wrote on his Telegram account postgame<\/a>. \u201cThank you for your faith and support!\u201d<\/p>\n The 2025-26 campaign is Kuznetsov\u2019s second back in the KHL after he and the Carolina Hurricanes<\/a> mutually terminated his NHL contract. He spent the first half of this season with Metallurg Magnitogorsk before being waived in January to join head coach Viktor Kozlov\u2019s Salavat team<\/a>.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Evgeny Kuznetsov had a scary moment during Sunday\u2019s KHL playoff game between his Salavat Yulaev and Lokomotiv Yaroslavl.…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":551297,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":"","_share_on_mastodon":"0"},"categories":[377],"tags":[5],"class_list":{"0":"post-551296","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-hockey","8":"tag-hockey"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/channels.im\/@nhl\/116393068716509701","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/551296","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=551296"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/551296\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/551297"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=551296"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=551296"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=551296"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}