From Dmitry Storozhev (translated):
Former youth player Ruslan Iskhakov is returning to the center, and the option for the left flank will be the club’s alumnus Egor Afanasyev , who already managed to play in the red-blue sweater in the KHL several years ago. Both forwards briefly appeared in the NHL last season – Ruslan debuted in the league in the last match of the regular season against Pittsburgh and even managed to score a point for an assist, and also appeared once during the playoffs, but Egor played two matches without scoring. The Islanders wanted to keep Iskhakov, and Nashville recently traded the rights to Afanasyev to San Jose, but in the end the forwards decided to return to their homeland.
Paul’s thoughts: As I have said on the show many times, Iskhakov needed to have a dominant year against the AHL to even have a shot with the big club and couldn’t do it. That’s not all entirely on him as Bridgeport was fielding an expansion-like team and posted it’s worst record in franchise history. Because of this he made the choice to play in the KHL over another year in Bridgeport. The Islanders will still retain his rights, but Iskhakov will make a lot more than the $70,000 he would make with Bridgeport (PuckPedia). Could he still be a New York Islander some day? Anything is possible, but for now I’ll be intrigued to watch him play with more professionals in the KHL and see how is game matures.
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