Makhachkala

A year earlier the same group had come up short of the top spot, taking silver in the 2021/2022 campaign.

The team plays out of Kaspiysk, at the Palace of Sports and Youth named after Ali Aliyev, a hall that holds 5,000 and can be pushed to 6,000 when needed. Games against VK Grozny carry the sharpest edge on the calendar, a fixture that turns into a stand-in for the wider rivalry between Dagestan and Chechnya.

Arsen Kirilenko took over as head coach in June 2026 after working with Grozny, arriving from the other side of that same rivalry. Around the same point, Magomed Gairbekov stepped away from coaching and playing duties to become President of the Dagestan Volleyball Federation, closing one chapter of involvement with the club to open another at the level above it. On court, Magomedkamil Dzhavatkhanov wears the captain's armband as diagonal.

That higher level is where the questions now sit.