Alex Burmistrov Interview

 

 

Editors Note: Andrey Osadchenko is a Thompson Rivers journalism graduate now living in Toronto. He’s an accredited member of the foreign press and writes for sports.ru and allhockey.ru. He spoke with Alex Burmistrov about his rookie season in Atlanta, the world junior championships and moving to Winnipeg.

I think, C-. And the only reason it would be so high, is because I made it to the NHL roster.

In a game against the Bruins I suffered a micro-injury. After that, I believe, I tried to be more careful and cautious out there. I should have given it a rest and sit it out a few games but I rushed myself into playing right away. I decided to play every single game there was left. I think, that was the reason my productiveness went downhill.

Sure they did. It was my rookie season, so I couldn’t refuse.

I didn’t even talk to my coaches about it. Pretty much everybody who was on the team had a minus. It was hard not to.

At the end of the season, I guess, I was pretty glad with my performance on the face-offs. I was way more confident in this sense than I was before. At the beginning of the regular season I didn’t do so well. I guess, I got used to that. I learned how my opponents performed on the face-offs. I watched them play and tried to improve my game at practices. My teammates helped me as well. One of them, for instance, was Rich Peverley, who won the Stanley Cup as a Bruin this season. I learned a lot from him.

A little bit of everything. Comparing to the previous season, I became faster and learned to make my decisions faster too. In the NHL you’ve got to think fast.

Of course. It happened quite a few times. And I wasn’t the only one. He would yell at anybody – it didn’t matter if you’re a star-player or anybody else. To be honest with you, I think of criticism as a word of advice. I don’t get offended by it. Even if coach tells me something I don’t necessarily agree with, I still listen to him very closely.

I don’t know. I think, there were a lot of memorable moments. For example, my fight with John Tavares. I can’t pick just one highlight. In any case, I try to forget about it and get ready for the next season.

It was the heat of the moment. He wanted to fight me. When I turned around he’d already dropped the gloves. I looked at him and thought to myself: “Well, alright. He doesn’t look too scary, I can fight him’. It was my first fight in North America. Last time I fought was back when I played junior hockey in Russia.

Well, Byfuglien didn’t really fight on our team. He fought when he used to play for the Blackhawks. In the Thrashers it was mainly Nick Boulton’s job. But everybody was positive about me getting into a fight. They had a little laugh and told me: ‘Well done! Great fight!’.

I think, the second one. I scored it on a road and it was a bit more significant for my team. I believe, we were up 2-1 at that point, and this was the third goal for us. As for the other goal, we were up 4-0 and late in the third period. For sure, that goal may have looked prettier but didn’t bear as much significance.

I didn’t even pay attention to this. You just broke the news to me, to be honest.

We had quite a few guys who managed to score beautiful goals last season. For instance, Meyer scored a beauty against the Isles. Peverley had a few sweet goals too. Everybody was really supportive to each other. We would skate over to our teammates, congratulate them and such. Jealousy was never an issue. We had a good group of guys.

It was pretty interesting. After the game against the Habs we had to go Florida. We had 2 days-off before the game. We went to a restaurant and then to a night club. As far as I recall, I had to tell a joke but I couldn’t pull that off because North-Americans don’t get our humour. I started telling the joke and stopped half-way through. I thought: ‘I’d better stop now than to embarrass myself later’. Then I had to dance and pantomime somebody from the team. I didn’t do the dancing part but pantomimed Brent Sopel. He has a very unique gameday routine, so it turned out to be quite funny.

I always hung out with the guys either we were on the road or at home. I spent a lot of time with Patrice Cormier. We hung out together pretty much every day. We would either go somewhere or just chill at my place. When we had a day-off, him and I would go a restaurant or for a walk. Evander Kane also hung out with us quite often.

As a matter of fact, when we were on the road I spent most of time with the vets. Because usually I went to the dinner with Nik Antropov and he hung out with the older crowd. So I would mainly talk to them.

No, I didn’t. I had my own season going on. I wanted to make it to the play-offs. In all honestly, such a thought has never crossed my mind.

If we didn’t have a game overlapping the World Juniors, I’d watch it live. If not, I’d still watch the highlights afterwards. I stayed tuned. I read everything that was published about the tournament at Allhockey.Ru and Sports.Ru, watched every video that was available too. I remember, during the round robin game between Russia and Canada part of our team was in the dressing-room taping the sticks for our own game, while me and some other guys were in a dining-room watching the game.

Not really. Of course, the Canadians were saying that Team Canada was going to win, and us, the Russians, vouched for our team. But there were only 2 of us, so the Canadians were more vocal. It was the other way around a bit later, though (smiling).

I did. I did because the Canadians had won the first game. And at this tournament it’s impossible to beat the same team twice.

Maybe just a little. For sure, I joked around but not too much. In any case, they came back at me with jokes about how Team Russia got kicked off the plane.

I don’t even want to think about them. I think our entire country longed for this win. The guys did everything they possibly could and saved the game in an incredible fashion. The tape of this game should be shown in hockey schools around the world so everybody would learn how to play and how to turn the games around. And yet there are some people that say bad things about the guys who managed to get this victory. I think they should be ashamed. The guys have won it fair and square. They deserved to celebrate it in any way they want to.

I did. Why wouldn’t I? I hoped to get called up. Especially, when it became clear that we were not going to make it to the play-offs. And then one day Viatcheslav Bykov gave me a call and told me that he expects me to come at Eurohockeytour.

You know, I spent only 2 weeks with the junior team in Saskatchewan. I didn’t go to the training camp or anything. So can’t really tell you much about the junior team. With the national team, however, I spent more time. I noticed that it’s more professional. Nobody watches after you. They see you as a pro. You have to do show what you’re capable of.

That was very difficult. I wanted to get on the ice and show what I can do. It’s fair to say that before the last 3 games I’ve given up hope and just waited for the season to end. Before that Denis Grebeshkov and I stayed focused and trained hard. Well, it’s all in the past now. I’ll get my chance eventually.

It’s hard to say. I’ve never been to the city. I don’t know what the fans are like over there. The only thing I know about them is that they’re very passionate about hockey. Within 2 weeks they bought out all the tickets for the season. It’s crazy. I can’t wait for the season to start. We’ll see how it goes. But then again I want to thank the city of Atlanta and local fans. True, there weren’t a lot of them but they were loyal. They were always there for us. I’m happy that this city has been a part of my life. I’m happy I was lucky enough to play there.

Well, there’s nothing I can do about, right? Nobody said it was going to be easy. Our job is to get out there and play. We have to try to make it to the play-offs, win the Stanley Cup, play hard in every single game. We’re not going to be seen as a weak team. Our opponents are going to see us as a new team that came out to fight. So they’re going to play even harder against us.

I heard it was cold out there. But is it really colder than in Novosibirsk?

Really? Well, ok. In my hometown, Kazan, it gets pretty cold too. So I’m not afraid. Besides, I can always buy a down-padded coat (laughter).

I can’t answer this question now. Tell you what – let’s make another interview after a few games into the season? Then I’ll be able to tell you more about our team. We’ll see how it’s going to pan out.