Metallurg Magnitogorsk () is a professional ice hockey club based in Magnitogorsk, Russia. It is a member of the Kharlamov Division in the Kontinental Hockey League (KHL).
Metallurg Magnitogorsk won the Gagarin Cup in the 2013–14 KHL season, 2015–16 KHL season, and the 2023–24 KHL season.
History Metallurg was founded in 1955 by the Magnitogorsk Iron and Steel Works (MMK) as a Class B team that competed in the Chelyabinsk Oblast and the RSFSR championships. Since 1980, they were led by the head coach Valery Postnikov. Under his leadership, the club won the Second League Class B, a fourth-tier league, and was promoted to the third-tier Second League Class A, then won its championships twice, in 1988–89 and 1989–90 seasons. After two more seasons in the second level of Soviet hockey, Metallurg became one of the founders of the International Hockey League (MHL), the first post-Soviet major professional hockey league. Thanks to MMK's funding, Metallurg acquired several key players from other clubs, including Sergei Mogilnikov from Torpedo Ust-Kamenogorsk, Andrei Martemyanov from Avtomobilist Yekaterinburg and Igor Ulshin from HC Sibir Novosibirsk. In their first season in the top flight, Metallurg managed to reach sixth place in the Eastern Conference, then upset HC Spartak Moscow, one of the historic powerhouses of Soviet hockey, in the first round of the playoffs before falling to Traktor Chelyabinsk in the second round. In the 1995 MHL playoffs, Metallurg reached the semifinals, and in 1996 they earned a spot in the final series, which they lost to HC Dynamo Moscow 1–3. Valery Postnikov coached the team until 1996, then his assistant Valery Belousov took over.
Metallurg carried over their status as one of the strongest teams into the Russian Superleague, and in the 1997–98 Russian Superleague season they won the cup for the first time, winning the final series 3–1 over Dynamo Moscow. This victory earned them a spot in the 1998–99 European Hockey League which they won. In the next season, Metallurg won both the regular season and the playoffs, earning the title of Champions of Russia. They also won their second European title in the 1999-2000 European Hockey League. In total, Metallurg advanced to the Russian Superleague finals six times and became a three-time champion of Russia. The club also won the 2008 edition of the IIHF European Champions Cup and reached the finals the Champions Hockey League in 2009, losing the final series to the Swiss ZSC Lions.
Evgeny Malkin started his career with Metallurg Magnitogorsk, signing his first professional contract before the 2003–04 Russian Superleague season. He played three seasons for Metallurg before leaving for the Pittsburgh Penguins with one year of the contract left after a dispute with the club's ownership. He would return to play for Metallurg during the 2012-13 NHL lockout.
Victoria Cup On 1 October 2008, Metallurg Magnitogorsk played against NHL's New York Rangers in the inaugural Victoria Cup at the PostFinance-Arena in Bern with an attendance of 13,794.IIHF Top 100 Hockey Stories of All Time, Szymon Szemberg and Andrew Podnieks, p. 167, Fenn Publishing, Bolton, Ontario, Canada, 2008, . Metallurg Magnitogorsk led most of the game, 3–0 at one point, but ultimately lost 4–3 by the Rangers' Ryan Callahan breakaway goal with 20 seconds remaining in the game.IIHF Top 100 Hockey Stories of All Time, Szymon Szemberg and Andrew Podnieks, p. 173, Fenn Publishing, Bolton, Ontario, Canada, 2008, . Denis Platonov, Vladimir Malenkikh and Nikolai Zavarukhin scored for Metallurg, and Dan Fritsche scored and Chris Drury scored twice for the Rangers. As a sign of respect, Russian Dmitri Kalinin and Ukrainian Nikolay Zherdev accepted the Victoria Cup trophy on behalf of the New York Rangers.
KHL
Metallurg Magnitogorsk was a founding member of the Kontinental Hockey League and qualified to the Gagarin Cup playoffs in all of its seasons. They won the Gagarin Cup in the 2013–14 KHL season, 2015–16 KHL season, and the 2023–24 KHL season.
In the inaugural season of the new league Metallurg played in the Tarasov Division and placed second after HC CSKA Moscow. In the playoffs, they won bronze medals after beating Torpedo Nizhny Novgorod 3-0 and Atlant Mytichtchi 3-1 and losing to Lokomotiv Yaroslavl 1–4.
In the second season, the KHL divided into conferences for the first time, and Metallurg was placed into the Kharlamov Division of the Eastern Conference. They finished the regular season on top of the division and defeated Traktor Chelyabinsk 3–1 in the first round of the playoffs, but were eliminated in the second round by the reigning champion Ak Bars Kazan in six games.
Sergey Mozyakin had been Metallurg's star player in the KHL. He played in Magnitogorsk between 2011 and 2021. His number 10 has been retired by the club. He holds the all-time goalscoring record in the KHL with 351 goals and held the points record with 928 points until it was beaten by Vadim Shipachyov in 2024. In the 2016-17 KHL season he set records for most points (85, beaten by Nikita Gusev in 2023-24) and most goals (48, beaten by Joshua Leivo in 2024-25) in a KHL regular season.
The 2021–22 KHL season had a nonstandard format because of the COVID-19 pandemic and the 2022 Winter Olympics, as the regular season was ended early and the Kontinental Cup was not awarded. Also, before the playoffs started, starting goaltender Juho Olkinuora elected to leave the team due to the 2022 Russo-Ukrainian War. Despite that, the team, with the veteran Vasily Koshechkin in net, built back on its momentum from the regular season, where they had the best points percentage and most goals scored of all KHL teams, and defeated Barys Astana, Avangard Omsk and Traktor Chelyabinsk on the way to the Gagarin Cup Final against HC CSKA Moscow. Metallurg then took a 3-1 lead in the series but allowed CSKA to come back, win three games in a row and the Gagarin Cup.
In the 2022–23 KHL season struggled during the regular season, finishing fifth in the conference, overcame a 3-2 deficit to win the first round matchup against Avtomobilist Yekaterinburg in Game 7 overtime, and were then swept by Avangard Omsk. The club management considered the result disappointing, so Ilya Vorobiev, the head coach who led the team to two Gagarin Cups, left the team. It was also the final season for Vasily Koshechkin, who lost the starting job to Edward Pasquale that season. At the time of his retirement Koshechkin held KHL records in games played (765), wins (378) and shutouts (90).
Before the 2023–24 KHL season, Metallurg hired Andrei Razin, who previously became Champion of Russia with the club as a player then coached Severstal Cherepovets, as the head coach. In his first season, he led the team to finish the regular season first in the Eastern Conference, then to advance past Amur Khabarovsk and HC Spartak Moscow with 4-2 victories in the first two rounds of the playoffs, defeat Avtomobilist Yekaterinburg in a seven-game semifinal series and finally sweep Lokomotiv Yaroslavl to lift the Gagarin Cup. In the Gagarin Cup Finals, Metallurg's 21-year-old goaltender Ilya Nabokov only allowed three goals in four games. Among other key contributors were Robin Press, Alexander Petunin and Daniil Vovchenko, who all followed Razin from Severstal. Nabokov was awarded playoff MVP and rookie of the year honors for the season, while Razin was recognized as its best coach.
In the following 2024–25 KHL season, Metallurg struggled with injuries, but managed to get to third place in the East and fourth place in the overall standings of the regular season. In the first round of the playoffs, they were matched against Avangard Omsk, which rebuilt their roster in the middle of the season and reached strong form by spring. Avangard won the series 4-2 and eliminated the reigning champions.
In the regular season of 2025–26 Metallurg recorded several historic achievements: they placed first in the overall standings and won the club's first Kontinental Cup, and set the KHL scoring record with 251 goals across the regular season. 21-year-old Roman Kantserov scored 36 goals and became the best goalscorer of the season and the youngest player to achieve this in KHL history. In the playoffs, they defeated HC Sibir Novosibirsk and Torpedo Nizhny Novgorod 4-1, then were eliminated by Ak Bars Kazan 1-4.
Season-by-season record For the full season-by-season history, see List of Metallurg Magnitogorsk seasons.
Note: GP = Games played, W = Wins, L = Losses, OTW = Overtime/shootout wins, OTL = Overtime/shootout losses, Pts = Points, GF = Goals for, GA = Goals against Season GP W L OTW OTL Pts GF GA Finish Playoffs 1997–98 46 31 5 - - 72 173 82 2nd, all league Russian Cup Champions, 3–1 (HC Dynamo Moscow) 1998–99 42 34 2 - - 74 180 80 1st, all league Champions of Russia, 4–2 (HC Dynamo Moscow) 1999–2000 38 24 9 1 1 78 132 96 3rd, all league Lost in Semifinals, 2–3 (Ak Bars Kazan) 2000–01 54 24 9 6 2 87 153 96 1st, Group A Champions of Russia, 4–2 (Avangard Omsk) 2001–02 51 28 15 3 3 95 152 125 5th, all league Lost in Semifinals, 0–3 (Lokomotiv Yaroslavl) 2002–03 51 23 14 2 4 85 121 101 6th, all league Lost in Quarterfinals, 0–3 (Severstal Cherepovets) 2003–04 60 35 18 2 1 114 176 129 1st, all league Lost in Finals, 2–3 (Avangard Omsk) 2004–05 60 34 15 2 4 115 193 124 3rd, all league Lost in Quarterfinals, 2–3 (Avangard Omsk) 2005–06 51 38 4 4 4 127 175 75 1st, all league Lost in Semifinals, 1–3 (Avangard Omsk) 2006–07 54 30 14 2 1 102 146 99 4th, all league Champions of Russia, 3–2 (Ak Bars Kazan) 2007–08 57 31 12 4 3 115 175 113 2nd, all league Lost in Semifinals, 0–3 (Lokomotiv Yaroslavl) 2008–09 56 25 15 13 3 104 174 148 2nd, Tarasov Lost in Semifinals, 1–4 (Lokomotiv Yaroslavl) 2009–10 56 34 15 6 1 115 167 111 1st, Kharlamov Lost in Conference Semifinals, 2–4 (Ak Bars Kazan) 2010–11 54 27 14 6 7 100 167 141 2nd, Kharlamov Lost in Conference Finals, 3–4 (Salavat Yulaev Ufa) 2011–12 54 29 20 3 4 94 150 137 2nd, Kharlamov Lost in Conference Semifinals, 1–4 (Avangard Omsk) 2012–13 52 27 13 0 12 93 167 121 3rd, Kharlamov Lost in Conference Quarterfinals, 3–4 (Salavat Yulaev Ufa) 2013–14 54 35 11 0 2 108 166 113 1st, Kharlamov Gagarin Cup Champions, 4–3 (Lev Praha) 2014–15 60 32 15 8 5 117 174 129 2nd, Kharlamov Lost in Conference Semifinals, 1–4 (Sibir Novosibirsk) 2015–16 60 25 20 13 2 103 180 138 1st, Kharlamov Gagarin Cup Champions, 4–3 (CSKA Moscow) 2016–17 60 36 13 5 6 124 197 135 1st, Kharlamov Lost in Gagarin Cup Finals, 1–4 (SKA Saint Petersburg) 2017–18 56 24 17 8 7 95 150 135 4th, Kharlamov Lost in Conference Semifinals, 1–4 (Ak Bars Kazan) 2018–19 62 35 19 6 2 84 182 132 2nd, Kharlamov Lost in Conference Quarterfinals, 2–4 (Salavat Yulaev Ufa) 2019–20 62 20 25 8 9 65 138 145 4th, Kharlamov Lost in Conference Quarterfinals, 1–4 (Barys Nur-Sultan) 2020–21 60 31 16 6 7 81 165 138 2nd, Kharlamov Lost in Conference Semifinals, 2–4 (Avangard Omsk) 2021–22 48 26 11 8 3 71 164 120 1st, Kharlamov Lost in Gagarin Cup Finals, 3–4 (CSKA Moscow) 2022–23 68 30 20 5 13 83 189 175 3rd, Kharlamov Lost in Conference Semifinals, 0–4 (Avangard Omsk) 2023–24 68 35 17 9 7 95 212 167 1st, Kharlamov Gagarin Cup Champions, 4–0 (Lokomotiv Yaroslavl) 2024–25 68 30 21 13 4 90 197 154 2nd, Kharlamov Lost in Conference Quarterfinals, 2–4 (Avangard Omsk) 2025–26 68 37 12 7 12 105 252 184 1st, Kharlamov Lost in Semifinals, 1–4 (Ak Bars Kazan)
Players
Current roster
Team captains
Sergei Mogilnikov 1991–94 Sergei Starkovski 1994–95 Mikhail Borodulin 1995–96 Evgeny Koreshkov 1996–97 Mikhail Borodulin 1997–99 Sergei Gomolyako 1999–2000 Evgeny Koreshkov 2000–03 Valeri Karpov 2003–05 Evgeny Varlamov 2005–06 Ravil Gusmanov 2006–08 Vitaly Atyushov 2008–11 Sergei Fedorov 2011–12 Denis Platonov 2012 Evgeni Malkin 2012–13 Sergei Mozyakin 2013–21 Egor Yakovlev 2021–25 Alexei Maklyukov 2025–26
Head coaches
Felix Mirsky 1955–57 Georgy Mordukhovich 1957–58