Never say never: Pelino returning to coach in KHL
“Just when I thought I was out, they pull me back in.”
David Pelino recited the iconic quote from “The Godfather: Part III” after his father, Mike Pelino, accepted an offer to return to coach in Russia.
The Millbrook resident and former Peterborough Petes coach is returning to Metallurg Magnitogorsk as an assistant coach for the second half of the 2020-21 Kontinental Hockey League season.
Pelino spent the first five of his seven seasons coaching in Russia in Magnitogorsk.
Pelino, 61, said in the spring he was finished in Russia.
“I had zero intention of going back,” said Pelino, before departing Wednesday.
“After seven years, I owed it to myself and my family to stay in Canada a little longer. It turned out to be a great decision, especially with the pandemic hitting. I’ve had a great number of months here in Millbrook and got to do a lot of things I wouldn’t normally have been able to do if I’d gone back.”
Metallurg head coach Ilia Vorobiev, who Pelino worked with for five years, reached out to see if he’d return. The pair left Magnitogorsk after Vorobiev was fired in 2018. Vorobiev went on to coach SKA St. Petersburg and Russia’s national team before returning to Metallurg.
“It is a good situation where I will only head over for half the season so it became a little bit of the best of both worlds,” Pelino said. “I’m really excited about the opportunity to go back. Ilia and I have worked together and are very good friends.
“It’s an attractive situation in a lot of ways. It’s an organization I’m familiar with. I think it’s a pretty solid team, although it’s been an up-and-down season for pretty well everyone, with COVID hitting the teams at different times. Coaching is in my blood. I’ve been doing it for 35 years. When we started talking a little bit more intimately about it, it jumped out that it was something I wanted to do again.”
If it had been a different situation, he says, he wouldn’t have gone back.
“I did have some other opportunities over there and I wasn’t interested,” he said.
The team currently sits in sixth place in the Eastern Conference with a 16-10-4 record. Pelino said the record is a bit misleading because the team has been hit hard by COVID-19 and played games short-handed.
“One thing the KHL has done is they’ve continued to have teams play even if it’s been ravaged by the virus. There have been times this year when Magnitogorsk has had as many as 10 players out at a spell,” he said.
Pelino contracted COVID-19 in the spring. He continues to donate convalescent plasma for therapeutic use as his blood still contains high levels of antibodies, he said.
If he hadn’t already had COVID-19, he wouldn’t be returning to Russia.
“I am going to continue to be careful and follow all the guidelines the government of Canada has set out in terms of wearing a mask, safe distancing, washing my hands, but I feel a lot more comfortable having gone through the virus than if I had not been touched by it,” he said.
He also has his family’s blessing.
“They play a big part in all my decisions,” he said. “There are mixed feelings. They loved having me home and I loved being home but we think this is the best decision for myself and my family. Coaching is my passion and I love it and they see that.”
He then added with a laugh: “At the same time, they wish I was home to continue to stock the fireplace and plow the driveway.”
Pelino also spent one season as assistant coach with Avangard Omsk and last season was head coach of Lokomotiv Yaroslavl.