Once the USSR collapsed, Russians were free to leave the country and join the NHL.
They single handedly turned the Red Wing franchise around. In 1996 the Russian 5 gave the Wings their first stanley cup in decades.
Federov, Fetisov, Konstantinov, Kozlov and Larionov........simply awesome players.....Of course having a couple of other guys like Yzerman and Lindstrom and Holmstrom certainly helped too........
Yeah I remember that. Wasn’t Kozlov the captain of the CCCP team?