Olli Juolevi Makes Team Finland’s World Junior Hockey Championship Roster

Team Finland finalized their World Junior Hockey Championship roster this morning, and to the surprise of nobody, Olli Juolevi was among those to make the cut. (h/t to Hockey Guy @FlyingSkate94 for tweeting out a link to the Finnish website with the final roster)

This year’s tournament will be Juolevi’s third in a row for Team Finland. Finland’s been up and down in the two years that Juolevi’s played for their World Junior roster. In the first year, Juolevi caught the hockey world’s attention with nine points (all assists) in seven games for Finland en route to a gold medal as a 17-year-old. In the next season, Juolevi captained Finland to an early and embarrassing exit, highlighted by their firing of the coach mid-tournament.

In total, Juolevi has nine assists in 15 games in two years of play at the World Junior and one gold medal.

No word yet on what the Finnish leadership group will look like, but I’d expect Juolevi to have a prominent role, if not the captaincy for the second year in a row.

In 20 games with TPS Turku in the Finnish Liiga, Juolevi has 15 points (five goals and nine assists), which is tied for fourth among under-20 skaters in the entire league.

A good performance at this year’s World Juniors would go a long way towards calming the nerves of anxious Canucks fans who were left wanting with Juolevi’s performances at the Young Stars Tournament in Penticton and the Canucks main training camp and pre-season.

Hopefully this year is a little more in line with Juolevi’s first in the tournament.