(CNN) -- Sergei Shevchenko is standing in an old Soviet era school building, staring at photos on a wall. The images show 10 smiling young men, wearing hockey jerseys. "Vitali Anikeyenko. I remember this young guy very well. He was very kind. He came from Kiev," Shevchenko says, pointing to a picture. "Maxim Shuvalov was the youngest. Born in 1993. He had just graduated from school." Russia mourns hockey players killed in plane crash Shevchenko knew them all. He was their history teacher and principal at Yaroslavl's School Number 9. He watched them learn, grow and realize their dream of playing for the only professional sporting team anyone in this small Russian city really cares about -- the Lokomotiv Hockey Club.
@highlight
37 players and officials from Lokomotiv were killed in plane crash on September 7 2011
@highlight
Flight was scheduled to land in Minsk but slammed into river just after take off
@highlight
Sergei Shevchenko was the history teacher and principal of 10 players
@highlight
Shevchenko: "They were heroes of their time."
"The spirit of hockey throughout these years has filled the life of this city so deeply it's now impossible to say where Lokomotiv ends and where @placeholder begins.
It sits next to another plaque, remembering former students who died in @placeholder's recent wars.