Where is the "Russian Rocket" hockey player Pavel Bure now?

He scored a lot in the NHL, but Russia remembered 5 goals against Finland

Hockey player Pavel Bure was lucky to play in the USSR championship, spend many years in the NHL, become a world champion and a Stanley Cup finalist. Today "Vesti Podmoskovya" will tell about the past and present of one of the best strikers in the entire history of world hockey.

Pavel Bure is a native Muscovite, but he was born in Minsk, where his mother, a native of the capital of Belarus, went to give birth. Until the fame of his father, swimmer Vladimir Bure, this surname was associated exclusively with watches of the famous brand. And she has a lot to do with the hockey player's family.

In 1815, the owner of a small watch factory Karl Bure moved from Revel (now Tallinn) to St. Petersburg. His son Pavle Bure successfully realized himself not only as an entrepreneur, but also as a designer of watches of a world famous brand. The watchmaker's grand-nephew Valeri Bure became a famous athlete in the USSR in certain circles - in the 30s of the last century, he defended the gates of the USSR national team on the water floor. Then he was repressed and returned to Moscow only in 1957, with his 7-year-old son Vladimir, who became a famous swimmer. He won a huge number of medals in the national championships, won four Olympic medals, won medals at the world championships and became the European champion. It was Vladimir who raised his two sons, Pavel and Valery, for Russian hockey.

Pavel was sent to the CSKA children's team as soon as he was 6 years old. At the same time, he played for another children's team - Olimpia. At the age of 17, Pavel was already preparing for games with the main team and made his debut for CSKA in 1988 in a duel with Dynamo from Riga. And already in the fourth minute of the game, he sent the puck into the gates of Riga. In the next season, Bure becomes the main player of the team and gradually increases his impressive performance. For 4 seasons in CSKA, Pavel became the USSR champion twice, won the European Champions Cup three times and scored 67 goals.

At the very beginning of 1989, he became the world champion in hockey among youth teams, playing in one troika with Mogilny and Fedorov. The three of them also fired up in CSKA. To be in the USSR national team in another legendary five, but soon the players parted ways. Mogilny again fled across the ocean, and then Fedorov. Pavel Bure becomes the world champion in 1990, in 1991 - the bronze medalist of the world forum and also buys a ticket overseas. The Vancouver Canucks were waiting for him.

Pavel came to Canada not alone, but with his father and younger brother Valery. Pavel's contract with Vancouver stated that Vladimir was also becoming his son's personal trainer. The contract was solid - Bure became the highest paid player of the season from Russia. 34 goals in the first season is a solid result and Pavel was named the best newcomer of the regular season. And already in the first year he earned the nickname "Russian rocket", which stuck with him forever. That is how Bure called the Vancouver Sun journalist Ian McIntyre: “This is the fastest creation since the Soviet Sputnik. The next two seasons were absolutely enchanting. In them, Pavel scored 60 goals, and for the second time this was enough to become the top scorer of the season. In the first season, the striker scored 110 points, in the second - 107. In the 1993-1994 championship, Vancouver made it to the Stanley Cup final, where they lost to the New York Rangers in a bitter struggle, winning three matches and losing four. In the Cup playoffs, Bure scored 31 points, scoring 16 goals and making 15 assists. In all three of these indicators, these were the club's new Stanley Cup records. With an excellent performance this season, Bure deserved to sign a new five-year contract worth $ 24.5 million.

But things didn't go well after the signing of the new contract. At the very beginning of the championship, the hockey player receives a severe injury to his right knee. He recovered only before the start of a new season, which began with the prestigious 1996 World Cup. However, in the exhibition game in front of him, Bure gets a new injury and the Cup will pass without him. And the season in “Vancouver” will be unsuccessful for the player and the team. For Bure, 55 points is a bad result. Vancouver missed the Stanley Cup playoffs for the first time in seven years. Bure also missed the ending of the season - now due to a back injury. Relations with the club's management deteriorated and Bure did not go to the site for a whole year, training with CSKA in Moscow. Pavel lost $ 5 million and was eventually traded to the Florida Panthers. Here, Bure gradually regained his striker's status, was able to win the prize of the best sniper once, but Florida itself did not shine. But here the brothers Pavel and Valery were able to play in the same team and even in the same five.

In 2002, Florida traded Pavel to the New York Rangers, where, due to the same knee injury, he spent only two vague seasons, ending his career after them at 32 years old.

In 1998, Bure had a chance to take part in the Olympics, which took place in Nagano, Japan. The Russian national team made up of stars hoped to bring gold medals from Japan. The Russians successfully overcame the group stage, beat Belarus in the quarterfinals with a score of 4: 1, and in the semifinals - Finland - 7: 4. The game with the Finns became Bure's benefit. He sent the puck into the Suomi goal five times. In another semifinal, the mighty Canada lost to the Czech Republic in shootouts and lost the chance of an overall victory. But playing with the Czechs was not an easier option for Russia. In the final, neither Bure, nor his partners, among whom were Yashin, Fedorov, Morozov, Kamensky and his brother Valery, could never beat the Czech goalkeeper Dominik Hasek. The Czechs scored just one goal after Peter Svoboda's throw, and that was enough to bring the Russian national team to their knees.

In total, in the national teams of the USSR and Russia, Bure played 38 matches, in which he scored 20 goals. On one occasion he won world championships at the adult, youth and junior levels. He was the silver medalist of the World Championship, and at the Olympiads he won silver and bronze.

In the NHL, Bure has 702 games and 779 points, of which 437 are goals scored.

Pavel finished his hockey career not only early, but also single. In the early 90s, he was married for just a year to Hollywood costume designer Jayme Bohn. He corrected this situation only in 2009. Prior to that, Bure had time to try himself in a new capacity “in civilian life” - in 2006 he was the general manager of the Russian Olympic team, but not very successfully.

In 2009, Pavel married Alina Khasanova, who is 15 years younger than him. The couple had a son, Pavel, a daughter, Palina, and a daughter, Anastasia. At the beginning of this year, it became known that the couple were expecting a fourth child. 

Pavel Bure never became a hockey coach. Apparently, he didn't want that. But the former forward takes part in various projects related to hockey, as an organizer and manager. So, since September 2013, he was the general manager of the hockey teams of the Krasnodar Territory and the person responsible for the development of this sport in the Kuban. But hockey New-Vasyukov from Krasnodar did not come out and in April 2014 Bure left this program. On the other hand, Pavel quite successfully fulfills the duties of a member of the Board and curator of the Moscow Night Hockey League conference. In 2015, he also received the wedding position of President of the International League of World Hockey Legends, and in 2018 he supported Russian President Vladimir Putin, joining the Putin Team movement. Bure had renounced his American citizenship two years earlier, which he received during his years in the NHL. The United States, too, was not left without Bure. The younger brother Valeri Bure is married to an American actress and they have three children, two of whom are already playing hockey at the youth level ...