Chelmet Chelyabinsk

Chelmet takes its identity from the Chelyabinsk Metallurgical Plant. It began in December 1948 as Metallurg, and stayed under that banner until 1990, when the plant's parent company, Mechel, put its own name on the sweaters instead.

The Mechel years produced the club's best hockey. It reached the RSFSR Championship podium twice, taking bronze in 1963 and silver in 1977, then spent 1997 to 2003 in the Russian Superleague, the country's top flight, before dropping back down. Danis Zaripov started his professional career there in 1997, and Mikhail Pashnin came through the same system before the New York Rangers drafted him.

That run ended in 2012, when Mechel the company cut off funding and the club had to be rebuilt from scratch. It emerged as Chelmet, a name fused from Chelyabinsk and Metallurg, and took on a new role as the farm team of Traktor, the KHL side across the city. The move also took the team out of the old Mechel Ice Palace and into the Yunost Sports Palace, which seats 3,650. Games against Traktor are still billed as the Chelyabinsk Derby, though the contest carries less edge than a normal city rivalry given one club now feeds players to the other.

Chelmet has played in the VHL, Russian hockey's second tier, since 2010, and its deepest run there came last season, when it reached the quarterfinals for the first time since 2011/12. Marat Askarov now runs the bench, with another playoff push the immediate aim.