28 jours avant la soirée d’ouverture : Alexander Mogilny (28e meilleur buteur de tous les temps)
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28 jours avant la soirée d’ouverture : Alexander Mogilny (28e meilleur buteur de tous les temps)
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28. Alexander Mogilny — 312GP | 139G | 169A | 308P | 1996-2000
Alexander Mogilny was born in Khabarovsk in the USSR on February 18, 1969. Mogilny was recognized as a talented hockey player at a very early age. He was recruited as a teenager to play with the CSKA Moscow team and became a full-time team member at 17-years old. In his first season with CSKA, Mogilny registered 15-goals and 1-assist in 28-games.
In 1987, Mogilny had the opportunity to represent the Soviet Union at the World Junior Championship, which was hosted in Czechoslovakia. Mogilny had 3-goals and 5-points in 6-games but the tournament ended in disqualification for both the Soviets and Canadians after the *Punch-up in Piestany—an infamous bench clearing brawl between both teams in the final game of the tournament (*[*https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Punch-up_in_Piestany*](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Punch-up_in_Piestany)*).*
In the aftermath of the brawl, the IIHF originally assessed 18-month suspensions for all involved players, but it was later reduced to six-months since the Soviet Union was hosting the World Junior Championship the following year. This gave Mogilny the opportunity to play in the 1988 World Juniors and later join the men’s team at the 1988 Winter Olympics in Calgary. Mogilny won the Silver Medal at the World Juniors and had 18-points in 7-games and was also recognized as the Top Forward of the tournament. Then, Mogilny won Olympic Gold with the Soviets in Calgary with 5-points in 6-games at 19-years old.
In 1989, Mogilny returned to the World Juniors as captain of the Soviet team and won the Gold Medal. He played that tournament alongside Sergei Federov and Pavel Bure and the trio dominated. Mogilny finished the tournament with 12-points in 7-games. Mogilny then participated in the 1989 World Championship that was hosted in Sweden. He won another Gold Medal that tournament, but had just 3-points in 10-games.
The year prior in 1988, Mogilny had been selected in the 5th round of the NHL Entry Draft by the Buffalo Sabres. Mogilny was motivated to move to North America and following the World Championship, he defected to North America. This was an unprecedented move at the time as Mogilny became the first Soviet player drafted into the NHL to defect to North America.
Mogilny started his NHL Career at 20-years old. He caught fire immediately scoring his first NHL goal in his first game just 20-seconds into his first shift. The rest of his rookie season fizzled as Mogilny struggled with adapting to North American life and the culture. He finished his rookie season with 43-points in 65-games. Mogilny took another step forward in his sophomore season finishing with 64-points in 62-games.
Mogilny really started to take star status in his third and fourth seasons with the Sabres. He followed up his sophomore season with 39-goals and 84-points in 1992. In the playoffs, Mogilny suffered a broken leg and missed the remainder of the postseason.
The next season Mogilny exploded with 76-goals and 127-points in 77-games. His 76-goals tied rookie sensation Teemu Selanne that season for the most in the league and stands as the 5th most in a season in NHL history. Mogilny’s point total also set the record at the time for most points in a single season by a Soviet/Russian player (since broken by Kucherov). The Sabres qualified for the playoffs that season, but Mogilny broke his leg in the 2nd round for a second consecutive year. Buffalo was then eliminated by Montreal.
In the 1993-94 season, Mogilny was sidelined to start the year while still recovering from his broken leg. Mogilny still managed to come back and play 66-games and produce 79-points. That year, he briefly served as Captain of the team and by doing so became the first Soviet/Russian born captain in NHL History. In the lockout year of 1994-95, Mogilny had 47-points in 45-games.
That summer, the Sabres were faced with some financial constraints as they needed to address new contracts for key players like Dominik Hašek and Pat LaFontaine. Mogilny became a salary casualty and was moved to the Vancouver Canucks on July 8th in exchange for Mike Peca, Michael Wilson, and a 1995 1st Round Pick.
One of the biggest snubs for the Hall of Fame to date. He needs to be in there.
The fact he isn’t in the hall of fame is insane.
First game I ever saw live Mogilny tied the game with five seconds left. It was against the Blues and it ended in a tie 5-5 I think.