Valeri Kharlamov

Valeri Kharlamov
Born	January 14, 1948(1948-01-14) Moscow, Russian SFSR, Soviet Union
Died	August 27, 1981(1981-08-27) (aged 33) Solnechnogorsky District, Russian SFSR, Soviet Union
Height	5 ft 8 in (1.73 m)
Weight	165 lb (75 kg; 11 st 11 lb)
Position	Left wing
Shot	Left
Played for	CSKA Moscow
National team	Soviet Union
Playing career	1967–1981
Hall of Fame, 2005

Valeri Borisovich Kharlamov (Russian: Валерий Борисович Харламов, IPA: [xɐrˈlaməf]; January 14, 1948 – August 27, 1981) was a star ice hockey player from the Soviet Union and was considered one of the greatest players in the world. He was voted one of six players to the International Ice Hockey Federation's (IIHF) Centennial All-Star Team in a poll conducted by a group of 56 experts from 16 countries. His only son Alexander is also a former hockey player. Valeri died in a car accident at the age of 33.

Playing career

Kharlamov began systematic training to play hockey at age 14, when he was admitted to the Children and Youth Sports School of CSKA on Leningradsky Prospekt, where his first trainers were Vitaly Erfilov and Andrei Starovoitov. Now it's Valery Kharlamov Specialized Children and Youth Sports School of the Olympic Reserve. At the age of twenty he was invited to the Soviet Union's national team to compete on the world stage. In 1971, playing in the Soviet Union Elite League for CSKA Moscow, his goal scoring earned him his first "Best Sniper Award" and he was voted to the national All Star team. The following year, Kharlamov gained international recognition when he led his national team to the Gold Medal at the 1972 Winter Olympics. He capped off the remarkable season by winning the scoring competition and being given the first of his two consecutive Soviet Union MVP Awards.

Summit Series

However, it was during the 1972 Summit Series that Valery Kharlamov, along with teammate Vladislav Tretiak, became the star of the hockey world. At Montreal, Quebec, in game one of the eight game international series against the best professionals from Canada, a virtually unknown Kharlamov astonished Canadian fans and their star hockey team with his explosive speed, agility, and goal scoring prowess. Kharlamov was voted the game's MVP after he scored two goals while leading his team to an upset victory that shook the foundations of Canadian professional ice hockey to the core.

Kharlamov was also the most penalized Soviet player in the series, his minutes exceeded only by Canadians Bobby Clarke and J. P. Parisé, who had an altercation with an official.

In game six of the fiercely fought series, Canada's Bobby Clarke, of the Philadelphia Flyers, slashed Kharlamov on his left ankle, causing a fracture. Although Kharlamov bravely continued in game six, he was unable to play in game seven and was ineffective in the final game. Some observers say that this injury was a crucial incident which turned the tide of the series in Canada's favour as they entered it losing 3 games to 1 in the series. Commentators believed that constant slashing of Kharlamov was in order to neutralize his goal scoring threat. Years later, John Ferguson, Sr., an assistant coach with Team Canada, was quoted as saying "I called Clarke over to the bench, looked over at Kharlamov and said, 'I think he needs a tap on the ankle.' I didn't think twice about it. It was Us versus Them. And Kharlamov was killing us. I mean, somebody had to do it."

By the end of the series, National Hockey League scouts were drooling at the thought of recruiting Kharlamov, but during this Cold War era, no Soviet Union player was allowed to leave the country. The respect for Kharlamov's skills was so high that at the time many Canadian children named him as one of their favorite players, and in the Soviet Union he was a national hero and an inspiration for youngsters playing the game.

Later career and death

In 1973, playing with the CSKA team of the Soviet Union's premier league, Kharlamov remained a star and was a key part of the Soviet national team that won the World Championship for the next three years. At the 1976 Winter Olympics, he scored the game winning goal in the final game to earn his second Olympic gold medal. During the North American tour, while playing against the Philadelphia Flyers in a memorable exhibition game, Kharlamov was knocked out by a hard hit from the Flyers' Ed Van Impe, causing his teammates to leave the ice in protest.

Later that spring, he was seriously injured in a car accident and for a time, his hockey career seemed in doubt. He was unable to play in the 1976 Canada Cup and, though he recovered sufficiently to return to the Soviet national team in the coming years, he was never again the player he once had been. He was a part of the Soviet Union team that lost to the "Miracle on Ice" U.S. team in the medal round at the 1980 Winter Olympics in Lake Placid, but won the silver medal. In August 1981, another automobile accident took his life at the age of thirty-three. Valeri Kharlamov is interred in the Novokuntsevskoe Cemetery in Moscow.

Honors

In 1998, Valeri Kharlamov was posthumously inducted into the International Ice Hockey Federation (IIHF) Hall of Fame.

In November 2005, Kharlamov was posthumously inducted into the Hockey Hall of Fame along with Cam Neely and former Hockey Canada president Murray Costello; Kharlamov became only the second non-NHL player to be inducted into the Hockey Hall of Fame (the other is former teammate Vladislav Tretiak).

Each year, the Kharlamov Trophy is awarded to the best Russian NHL player as voted by all Russian NHL players.

The Kontinental Hockey League has a division bearing his name. The main trophy of the Minor Hockey League is named the Kharlamov Cup.

Russian hockey players Ilya Kovalchuk and Evgeni Malkin wear the #17 and #71 (reversed 17) respectively, in honour of Kharlamov. The number is retired by both HC CSKA Moscow and the Russian national men's ice hockey team.

American journeyman hockey player Todd Harkins portrayed Kharlamov in the 2004 movie Miracle about the 1980 U.S. Olympic Hockey team's medal round win over the Soviet Union.

Family

His mother, Begoña, was a Spaniard Basque. She was one of the niños de la guerra (war children) who arrived in the USSR as war refugees during Spanish Civil War.

Awards

Medal record
Men's ice hockey
Olympic Games
Gold	1972 Sapporo	Team
Gold	1976 Innsbruck	Team
Silver	1980 Lake Placid	Team
NHL Challenge Cup
Gold	1979 New York City	Team
World Championships
Gold	1969 Sweden	Team
Gold	1970 Sweden	Team
Gold	1971 Switzerland	Team
Silver	1972 Czechoslovakia	Team
Gold	1973 Soviet Union	Team
Gold	1974 Finland	Team
Gold	1975 West Germany	Team
Silver	1976 Poland	Team
Bronze	1977 Austria	Team
Gold	1978 Czechoslovakia	Team
Gold	1979 Soviet Union	Team

Career highlights - team:

• 11-time winner of the USSR championship
• 8-time winner of the International Ice Hockey Federation World Championship
• 2-time winner of the Olympics Games Gold Medal

Career highlights - personal:

• National awards:
  • MVP USSR League 1972, 1973
  • USSR All Stars 1971-1976, 1978
  • Scoring champion (goals) 1971
  • Scoring champion (points) 1972
• International awards:
  • Voted "Best Forward" at the 1976 World Championship
  • IIHF All Star: 1972, 1973, 1975, 1976
  • Inducted into Hockey Hall of Fame in 2005

Career statistics

				Regular season
Season	Team	League		GP	G	A	Pts	PIM
1967–68	CSKA Moscow	Soviet		15	2	3	5	6
1968–69	CSKA Moscow	Soviet		42	37	12	49	24
1969–70	CSKA Moscow	Soviet		33	33	10	43	16
1970–71	CSKA Moscow	Soviet		34	40	12	52	18
1971–72	CSKA Moscow	Soviet		31	24	16	40	22
1972–73	CSKA Moscow	Soviet		27	19	13	32	22
1973–74	CSKA Moscow	Soviet		26	20	10	30	28
1974–75	CSKA Moscow	Soviet		31	15	24	39	35
1975–76	CSKA Moscow	Soviet		34	18	18	36	6
1976–77	CSKA Moscow	Soviet		21	18	8	26	16
1977–78	CSKA Moscow	Soviet		29	18	24	42	35
1978–79	CSKA Moscow	Soviet		41	22	26	48	36
1979–80	CSKA Moscow	Soviet		41	16	22	38	40
1980–81	CSKA Moscow	Soviet		30	9	16	25	14
Soviet totals				438	293	214	507	318

See also

• List of ice hockey players who died during their playing career

External links

• Valeri Kharlamov's biography at Legends of Hockey
• Valeri Kharlamov's career stats at The Internet Hockey Database
• Valery Kharlamov

Preceded by Anatoli Firsov	Soviet MVP 1972, 1973	Succeeded by Vladislav Tretiak
Preceded by Alexander Maltsev	Soviet Scoring Champion 1972	Succeeded by Vladimir Petrov