Rangers prospect Cherepanov, 19, dies at game in Russia

MOSCOW -- A Russian lawmaker said Tuesday that rising hockey star Alexei Cherepanov, a first-round draft pick of the New York Rangers, may have died due to negligence on the part of paramedics who responded to an emergency call.

Cherepanov, 19, died Monday during a Continental Hockey League game outside of Moscow.

Alexei Cherepanov was the 17th overall pick in the 2007 draft. (AP)

Russian investigators said Cherepanov suffered from chronic ischemia, a medical condition in which not enough blood gets to the heart or other organs.

Pavel Krasheninnikov, who sits on the Russian Hockey Federation's supervisory council and is a member of the State Duma, said there was no ambulance on duty at the arena where Cherepanov's Russian team, Avangard Omsk, was playing.

He asserted that emergency workers took too long to respond and didn't have a defibrillator, a machine used to shock the heart. It was unclear how much time it took paramedics to respond.

"There are elements of negligence here," Krasheninnikov said in televised comments.

Moscow regional investigator Yulia Zhukova said officials would look into why Cherepanov was playing with ischemia, and said officials could open a criminal investigation.

Former Rangers captain Jaromir Jagr played a shift with Cherepanov and was talking to him on the bench shortly after they left the ice, when Cherepanov suddenly collapsed, said a Rangers spokesman who talked to Jagr.

There was no collision that preceded the collapse, the spokesman said, but few other details were available. Cherepanov scored the first goal of the game and had eight in 15 contests this season, his third with Avangard Omsk.

"It was really kind of a surreal thing for the players," Cherepanov's agent Jay Grossman said. "He was skating in on a 2-on-1 with Jaromir and then they came back to the bench. Jaromir was talking to him and he told him he has to score on that play. The next thing you know, he collapsed.

"(Jagr) went with him into the dressing room area and they revived him for some time and then he didn't make it," Grossman said.

Amateur video taken at the game showed players and coaches gathered around the Avangard bench, then carrying a player who appeared to be Cherepanov.

Grossman said Monday that testing done on Cherepanov at the NHL combine before last year's draft didn't reveal any heart problems. He has been told that players in the KHL receive regular heart and blood tests, similar to those given in the NHL.