PWHL Draft Profile: Anna Shokhina

There are several wildcards in the upcoming PWHL Draft, and none are bigger than Russia's Anna Shokhina. Shokhina is one of several international veterans who should attract the attention of PWHL teams in the 2025 Draft.

Shokhina, 27, is Russia's premier forward, but that title has commanded less respect and attention during Russia's ban from international competition. The last time Russian athletes competed against the best national teams in women's hockey was at the 2022 Olympics, where Russia had to compete as Team ROC and snuck in just before the invasion of Ukraine. The Worlds and Olympic Games are an imperfect means of measuring the truly elite against each other, but they're one of the few tools we have. For the last few years, we have had no measurement of Shokhina outside of her production in Russia's pro league.

The thing is, Shokhina has continued to shred the ZhHL.

In 2023-24, Shokhina moved from Tornado to Dynamo-Neva St. Petersburg. In that first season with her new team, she led Dynamo in scoring with 58 points in 40 games and guided her new team to a title. In 2024-25, Dynamo lost in the final, but Shokhina scored 73 points in 42 games and averaged nearly two points per game in the playoffs.

It's worth noting that Shokhina outscored recent PWHL Vancouver addition Hannah Miller in the ZhHL in the 2022-23 season. It's also worth noting that, for a time, the ZhHL was considered either the third or fourth most competitive league in the world. And Shokhina has dominated in that league since she was a teenager. Her career Pts/GP average, per EliteProspects, is 1.94.

She's lon ready for a new challenge. In 2022, Shokhina was reportedly interested in moving to the SDHL to sign with Luleå/MSSK, but that deal unraveled because of Russia's war on Ukraine. Of course, it's crucial to note that the Boston Fleet selected Ilona Markova in the third round of the 2024 Draft. Markova didn't sign with the Fleet, but she still has designs on playing in the PWHL.

Shokhina is one of three Russians who have registered for the 2025 Draft, the others being her Dynamo teammate, Fanuza Kadirova, and Yale defender, Vita Poniatovskaia. Russia's exhaustive assault on Ukraine casts a long shadow over these PWHL hopefuls. Of course, controversy has not prevented PWHL teams from drafting or signing players before, but this feels different. As complicated as it may be, it is difficult to divorce the Russian players, particularly Shokhina and Kadirova, from the IIHF's ban on Russia playing in international competition, which is a result of the invasion of Ukraine.

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So, this is tricky. This represents a potential headache, and different options will be available on draft day that require less ibuprofen. With that said, Shokhina represents an interesting gambit. She will surely provide scoring depth, even though it seems a certainty that she will need to adjust to the speed of the PWHL game. And scoring depth will be difficult for some teams, especially those who lost firepower in the expansion draft to Seattle and Vancouver, to ignore.

What may decide Shokhina's fate on draft day is that her stock has fallen as a direct result of Russia being banned from international competition. Equivalency models for the ZhHL are outdated, but a team with a shrewd scouting department like Montreal may have a good grasp on what Shokhina can (or can't) do as a middle-six forward in the PWHL. That will be one of many stories to watch for on draft day.