Hello hockey fans:
I'm so glad I'll have an opportunity to keep a draft diary this season for NHL.com. For my first post of the season, I thought I'd provide a little background.
My dad's family was all born in Canada. My grandpa, dad and both his brothers played and coached hockey most of their lives. My Uncle Dale currently coaches the Saskatoon Contacts, AAA Midget team. My cousin, Jimmy, is a senior at the University of Michigan and my Uncle Lane is the associate coach with the New York Islanders, so right now that's my favorite NHL team.
My mom and her family are all Finnish and live in Finland and are also very involved in ice sports. My Aunt Eija played for Finland in the Ringette World Championships and won a bronze medal. My Uncle Jussi coached Finland to a gold medal at the Ringette World Championships.
I've always gone to school and played hockey in Finland except for one full season and a couple of years of spring hockey in Saskatoon, so in 2019 when I was offered a Liiga contract with HIFK when I was 15, it was just the natural thing to do. I wasn't old enough or eligible to play in the Canadian Hockey League then, so being able to play in the top junior league in Finland and Liiga games was a great opportunity.
Playing in Finland also made it more possible to play with Finland's national teams during the season because they have breaks in the league schedules. The previous season, I had played three tournaments with the Under-16 Finnish National Team, three tournaments with the Under-17 team and the Gretzky Hlinka Cup with the Under-18 team. Those were a lot of fun and it was a great experience, so I wanted to be able to continue to do that.
My dad has told me to approach this year the same as every other year and just keep doing what I've been doing, have fun and try to get a bit better every day, and that's my mindset for this season.
My mom has done so many things to help me. I can't list them all, but they range from putting the goalie equipment on when we've needed a goalie, to taking care of my nutrition, often cooking four or five meals a day for me.
We've started the season well at JYP (5-4, three overtime wins). We won our final three preseason games and have points in eight of our 12 regular-season games, including the last five in row so it's been really nice to get back on the winning track after last season (13-34, 4-8 in OT). We have some new Finnish players, three Canadian players, a Sweden-born player and a Czech Republic-born player who weren't here last season. Everyone is working really hard.
