Washington Capitals forward Evgeny Kuznetsov has completed serving his four-year suspension levied by the IIHF in August of 2019 when the Russian center tested positive for cocaine. Cocaine is a banned substance by the World Anti-Doping Agency (WADA).
Kuznetsov is now eligible to play in national team tournaments although Russia is still currently banned from the events due to the country’s invasion of Ukraine. WADA released the news to Russian news agency TASS on Saturday.
Kuznetsov’s suspension officially lifted last month on June 12 but WADA had not confirmed that until now.
“Once the period of ineligibility ends, the athlete is eligible to compete under the World Anti-Doping Code,” WADA told TASS and as translated via Google Translate. “As for any specific qualification requirements for the relevant professional leagues, you will need to contact them directly.”
The final sentence in that statement pertains to questions about Kuznetsov’s potential future participation in Russia’s KHL once his NHL career ends. Despite his severe IIHF punishment, the NHL did not act on his positive cocaine test due to the fact that the league does not consider drugs of that nature to be doping and is not bound by WADA policy.
That is not the case in the KHL as the league signed a memorandum with WADA and the IIHF in 2018 for anti-doping activities. Technically, the KHL is not fully bound to those regulations either but have deferred to WADA for testing and adhered to their suspensions.
The next international event that Kuznetsov could possibly participate in would be the NHL and NHLPA’s World Cup of Hockey that is tentatively scheduled for 2025. The NHL has yet to rule whether or not Russia will be ineligible for the event.
Both Russia and Belarus’ status for the 2026 Winter Olympics is still up in the air as those games are run by the IIHF. IIHF President Luc Tardif has said that the next period of reevaluation for the two countries’ participation will come in March of 2024. Olympic qualification rounds start in summer 2024.
Participation of NHL players in those games in general is still up in the air. However, NHLPA executive director Marty Walsh is intent on making sure that does occur.
“My focus is to try and make that happen,” Walsh told ESPN last Tuesday. “I’m working with commissioner Gary Bettman, collectively together with the IIHF, and hopefully, we’ll be able to come up with an agreement and move forward. A lot of players from around the globe want to play for their home country. They want that best-on-best tournament. They want to be part of it.”
Headline photo: Alan Dobbins/RMNB
