You'll say: Zhitnik plays for the Russian national team? Yes, that's true. But he has a Ukrainian passport, he considers Kyiv his home, and he played for the Russian team because... Well, let's listen to him himself.
"Yes, I played for the Russian national team. I've known the guys who played and play on it for 10-12 years, since the days of the USSR youth and junior teams. For me, Ukraine and Russia are like one country. I'm a man of another era, the Soviet era. I speak Russian, I live in Kyiv, like my parents. In North America, I just work. Besides, when I was offered to play for the Russian team, Ukraine simply had no national team. So I had no dilemma about which team to play for."
Alexei Zhitnik is like the last of the Mohicans of Ukrainian hockey overseas. In principle, there were not so many of our compatriots, as well as graduates of our youth sports schools who later adopted the more promising Russian citizenship from a sports standpoint, playing in the NHL. But earlier they were somehow special, if you will. They stood out from the crowd and were among the leaders in their clubs. You can't say that about the current generation yet.
In the current NHL regular season, Ruslan Fedotenko cannot find his game with the Tampa Bay Lightning, and with the Toronto Maple Leafs, forward Alexei Ponikarovsky scores once in fifteen games. Sergei Varlamov never got going with the St. Louis Blues and left for Russia. And you don't even want to remember the Ukrainians languishing in the lower leagues. Perhaps only Denis Shvidky, Vitaly Vishnevsky, and Dainius Zubrus, who were raised in Kharkiv but now play under the flags of Russia and Lithuania, are worthy of attention. But even they are far from being stars in the most star-studded hockey league in the world.
The only one about whom, after Dmitri Khristich and Oleg Tverdovsky left for Russia, no additional information is needed in the USA and Canada is Alexei Zhitnik - Olympic champion in Albertville, silver medalist at the Nagano Olympics, one of the best Russian defensemen in the NHL.
As is customary in hockey, the talent of the young "Falcon" was noticed while he was still on the approach to the main roster. At the age of 13, he was already being invited to various USSR national teams, making it clear that the coaches in the Union did not eat their bread for nothing.
"My brother and I were seven years old," recalls Alexei, "when our sister brought us to the Ldinka. At first we trained with Yuri Sapetny, and about six months later we moved to Valeri Gol'dobin. Soon a new rink was built on Melnikov Street, and we were transferred there. At 16, I joined the School of Higher Sports Excellence. And a year later I went through preseason training with Sokol and played two years on that team under Anatoli Bogdanov. At that time, Kyiv had a star lineup: Naida, Stepanishchev, Shiryaev, Gorbushin... By the way, I started playing paired with Sergei Gorbushin. He was my first mentor. At the beginning of the season he left for France, and I began playing with Valeri Shiryaev. He also helped me a lot."
Zhitnik could not escape the attention of Moscow CSKA, which in Soviet times was accustomed to skimming the cream off the Union's hockey schools, taking advantage of its right to draft conscription-age youngsters into its ranks. In 1991, he was "drafted" by Viktor Tikhonov, who also headed the national team. And the USSR national team was then formed, if anyone remembers, on the basis of CSKA - more than half of the national team members were army players.
Alexei did not stay long in CSKA: the USSR collapsed like a house of cards. But that season remained with him for life. As part of the CIS national team, he went to the Olympic Games in Albertville and left there as a champion. "At that time I played on the first line at CSKA, and on the national team Viktor Tikhonov put me on the Dynamo unit - in the company of Dmitri Yushkevich, Alexei Kovalev, Alexei Zhamnov, and Sergei Petrenko. That team, by the way, was no longer three-quarters army. It had representatives of all Moscow clubs. Despite my youth, the coaches trusted me, and I took the ice on both the power play and the penalty kill. In short, I was not in a supporting role. After I was given the medal - right on the ice - I felt nothing special. Only over time did I understand what we had achieved. After all, winning the Olympics is like winning the Stanley Cup. You can play brilliantly for 20 years, be a great master, but remain without titles. I was lucky."
He had to say goodbye to CSKA in 1992. With the collapse of the USSR, he transferred to Kyiv and took the oath of allegiance to Ukraine. And that same year, without having played another match for Sokol, he left for the USA. It all turned out quite fairly: although Zhitnik became an Olympic champion as a Moscow army player, compensation for the player's transfer to an NHL club was received by his home team - Sokol. After all, Alexei spent only one year at CSKA.
Zhitnik became the fifth Ukrainian hockey player drafted by an NHL club. Before 1991, the draft procedure (albeit in absentia) had been undergone by Kyivans Mikhail Tatarinov (1984), Dmitri Khristich (1988), Andrei Sidorov (1989), and Alexander Godynyuk (1990). He ended up with an aging Los Angeles Kings, whose main star was the famous Wayne Gretzky, and his company was Jari Kurri and Luc Robitaille. And in his very first season, Alexei was not content with the role of a promising rookie, but staked out a place on the first line next to Gretzky himself. The start could not have been better!
"At the first practice," Zhitnik shares his impressions, "Gretzky was the first to come up to me, said hello, and then the others began to get acquainted. In fact, I was the first Russian in Los Angeles, because the first 'our man' to play for the Kings in the 80s, Leningrader Viktor Nechaev, played only two or three games there. He, by the way, still lives in California."
In their very first season, Zhitnik and Los Angeles reached the Stanley Cup finals, but the Californians were not destined to become champions. But the Ukrainian gained invaluable experience of playing and off-ice communication in the NHL. The bodyguard of Gretzky himself, Mighty McSorley, once promised to look after Zhitnik during games, although he noted that the Kiev native could also stand up for himself.
"On Valentine's Day we were playing in Dallas, and on the 15th we were to play the next game. But already in the morning I was asked to go up to the general manager. Together with the head coach, they explained that in order to improve the team play, a player trade had occurred (three on one side and three on the other). I and two others are going to Buffalo. The plane is at ten o'clock, they will give us tickets, they will sort out the equipment. They say, no problems, but you are no longer players of the Los Angeles Kings.
At first I thought something was wrong with me, but then I realized that a trade is a quite ordinary phenomenon. It just happens often to some and rarely to others. Gretzky himself was traded about four times. According to statistics, nowadays each player's average stay with one team is three years.
I ended up in Buffalo, where the pair of Alexander Mogilny and Pat LaFontaine shone. The famous Dominik Hasek also played there, but at that time he was in the shadow of the famous Grant Fuhr. By the way, with my arrival Hasek began to play in the main lineup. After all, Fuhr left for Los Angeles on the same day we headed for Buffalo".
The difference between the cities turned out to be enormous. Los Angeles has 10 million residents, Buffalo has just over a million. In Los Angeles in January it is +20, in Buffalo snow lies as expected. And the way of life is completely different. By American standards, Buffalo is an ancient city. It is about 200 years old. The city is located virtually on the border with Canada. At games against Canadian clubs, there are always several thousand of their fans in the stands. And before games, two anthems are played in the arena - the American and the Canadian, although there is practically no division into Canadians and Americans in the NHL. If you check the statistics, you will find that 80% of hockey players have Canadian citizenship, and out of 27 clubs, 22 are American.
To cross the border between the countries, even a driver's license is enough - any official document satisfies the authorities. There are people who live in one country and work in another.
...At the time when Alexei moved north, Buffalo was considered a very solid club. But over time, the Blades turned into a mediocre team and for several years in a row did not make the playoffs. Zhitnik's personal statistics also worsened, as he no longer shows the same scoring as in his first seasons. In this respect, however, the playing style of the Ukrainian's current team has an effect. Buffalo is hard to classify as an attacking team. A defenseman in such a club has to work more in his own zone and increase the number of penalty minutes.
"I am generally not a soft, but not a rough player either. Rather, average. Over a season I accumulate about 100 penalty minutes. Sometimes I have to 'meet' someone hard, sometimes I even need to commit a foul. But you need to know when to do it. If we concede a goal while I am sitting on the penalty bench, the coach won't pat me on the head. The same goes for joining the attack. You need to feel the moment when you can go forward. After all, if you are 'stuck' on the opponent's half, while an opposing forward is in charge in your zone, you won't stay on the team for long. Even if you have excellent statistics, in that case your teammates will 'rot' you".
So far Zhitnik has managed to avoid falling into the coaches' bad books. The evidence is his playing time. In this indicator, Alexei has been among the best in the League in recent years. Only recognized 'bisons' spend more time on the ice. Being among the very best of several hundred NHL players is, you will agree, a considerable achievement. And all that remains is to wish that the graduate of Kiev hockey plays several more excellent seasons in the NHL and finally wins the Stanley Cup too. To stand in the same row with legendary hockey players who managed to win victories in the biggest competitions both among clubs (Stanley Cup) and among national teams (Olympic Games).