The men of the season picked up their awards at the JHL Closing Ceremony.

The Closing Ceremony of the fourteenth OLIMPBET Junior Hockey League season took place in Moscow. The best players of the 2022/23 season got their prizes.

Most valuable player of the season
Ivan Demidov (SKA-1946)

The 16-year-old forward of the Saint Petersburg team has become one of the most point-producing and extensively discussed JHLers. By the time he turned 17, Demidov had beaten a number of records for 16-year-old players. He made his KHL debut with SKA, participated in the Challenge Cup and the KHL All-Star Game. Demidov became the JHL’s all-time assists leader among players under 17 (33 assists in the regular season), and also surpassed Nikita Kucherov in points scored (55 points scored by Demidov in 47 games versus 54 points scored by Kucherov in 53 games). The only player with a better result is Demidov’s teammate Matvei Michkov with 84 points. The forward is ranked third in the history of the League among players under 17 in terms of goals scored (22). In total, Demidov played 54 games in the regular season and the playoffs, scored 14 goals and was credited with 53 assists.

Best goalie
Sergei Murashov (Loko)

The 19-year-old netminder was adjudged to be the best goalie with the lowest goals against average (1.58) and the most shutouts (11). Murashov’s solid performance lent a weighty contribution to Loko winning the Gold Division of the Western Conference. The goalie appeared in 42 games (37 for Loko and 5 for Loko-76). He is second best in terms of saves percentage (94.6) and follows Artemy Pleshkov (Kapitan) in the ranking. Murashov played ten playoff games and won six of them.

Best defenseman
Artyom Zhukov (Sibirskie Snaipery)

The most point-producing defenseman of the regular season averaged a fair bit less than one point per game. In 47 games, he scored 11 goals, was credited with 34 assists (45 points) and had +25. He was one of the key powerplay players of Lev Berdichevsky’s team. He was paired with the second best point-producing defenseman of the season Alexei Varennik. Zhukov also had the most assists by a defenseman in the 2022/23 season.

Top goalscorer 
Alexander Morozov (Sakhalinskie Akuly)

Morozov spent his third and final JHL season with Sakhalinskie Akuly. In the 2022/23 season, he scored 35 goals and became the top goalscorer of the regular season. Morozov was ranked first at the start of the season, then he moved down the rating-list, but eventually broke away from the nearest pursuer Raul Yakupov (Reaktor) by three goals. In total, the forward played 155 JHL games and scored 88 (51 + 37) points.

Top scorer
Kirill Pukelo (Mikhailov Academy)

The 20-year-old forward scored 68 (19+49) points in 50 games. Kirill was one of the top ten scorers of the 2021/22 season with 66 (21+45) points scored in 58 games, he improved his statistics in the 2022/23 season and took the first place. Pukelo broke away from the nearest pursuer (Daniil Sotishvili from Dinamo-Shinnik) by three points. The 2022/23 season was the forward’s final one in the JHL, he spent two years with Mikhailov Academy and scored 134 (40+94) points in 108 regular season games.

Best coach
Nikolai Voyevodin (Chaika)

The 49-year-old specialist was born in Nizhny Novgorod. He spent most of his playing career in his hometown. After seven years with HC Sarov in the VHL as a coaching staff member, he became the head coach of Chaika in the 2019/20 season to coach the team to the Kharlamov Cup four years later. With Voyevodin behind the bench, the Nizhny Novgorod team finished second in the Gold Division of the Eastern Conference. Their future final opponent Omskie Yastreby was the highest seed due to a bigger number of regulation wins. Voyevodin was behind the bench for 257 JHL games.

Best rookie
Ivan Anoshko (Dinamo-Shinnik)

Anoshko, who spent his debut season in the JHL with Dinamo-Shinnik, scored at least one point in each regular season game and became the top scorer of the season among rookies. He had highest face-off winning percentage (64.4) and most hits (99) among all JHL debutants. The forward helped the Belarusian team to make it to the play-in and get several nice wins over Gold Division teams.

Best linesman
Alexander Litvinov

The 24-year-old official spent his fourth season in the JHL, he worked 34 regular season games, one play-in game and nine playoff games. In total, he has 127 JHL games under his belt.

Best referee
Nikita Shalagin

The 2020/21 KHL Golden Whistle award winner as the linesman of the year retrained as referee and worked his first JHL game in December 2022. Shalagin totals 71 games in the Junior Hockey League (including two play-in games and 18 playoff games).

Best fan
Pavel Klepinin (Krylya Sovetov)