Dahlin, Ehn have gone from childhood neighbors to NHL opponents

Christoffer Ehn estimates he was 12 years old when he first got to know Rasmus Dahlin.
Ehn and a group of friends would get together to play street hockey in their hometown of Lidköping, Sweden. Eventually, younger kids from the neighborhood asked to join them.
"Rasmus was one of those kids," Ehn said inside the visiting dressing room at KeyBank Center on Thursday. "I knew he could skate back then, too. He had incredible talent to be that young."

A decade later, Dahlin and Ehn both marvel at the fact that a pair of kids who grew up as neighbors in Lidköping - which has a population just north of 25,000 - have now played two NHL games against one another, with a third meeting set for tonight.
Ehn, the goalie in their neighborhood street hockey games, was a fourth-round pick by Detroit and has played 54 games as a rookie forward in the NHL this season. Dahlin, who's four years younger, was the No. 1 overall pick last summer and has lived up to expectations for Buffalo.
Their first NHL meeting came in Detroit on Nov. 24. They played again in Buffalo on Feb. 9.

"It's surreal," Ehn said. "I played another one of my friends who I played with all along in junior hockey and plays for Anaheim [forward Jacob Larsson], and it's the same thing. It feels kind of crazy that we're actually here playing each other. It's a lot of fun."
"It felt so weird," Dahlin said. "We said to each other, 'Yeah, now we're in the NHL together.' … It's amazing."
While the NHL was always a dream, Ehn said he and Dahlin already had to pinch themselves when they played as teammates for Frolunda of the SHL last season.
"That's the team you grow up idolizing and the team you wanted to play on," he said. "But as things move on and you realize that you maybe have a shot of making it here, of course this is the dream because you're playing against the best players.
"But even to get from a small town like ours, to play for our favorite club in Sweden, that was pretty great for us."
Ehn has been a regular in the Detroit lineup since returning from a five-game stint with organization's AHL affiliate in Grand Rapids on March 7. He scored the winning goal in a 3-2 victory over San Jose on Monday, the third of his rookie campaign.
All the while, he's watched as the defenseman who used to hold his own with the older kids makes his own smooth transition to the NHL.
"It's been so impressive to follow him throughout his younger years, the drive he has and how he practices," he said. "To see his transition over here has been pretty smooth too, it's really fun to see."