Patrik Laine may be 15 years younger than Team Finland’s elder statesman, veteran goalie Pekka Rinne, but the 18-year-old isn’t about to start cracking Old Man jokes anytime soon.
“I have zero NHL games,” Laine says, grinning, as he unties his skates after practice. “I can’t make fun of anybody.”
That’s a solid point.
There’s a lot of talk about the youth and inexperience on this Finnish team—their No. 1 pairing on defence is 21-year-old Rasmus Ristolainen and 22-year-old Olli Maatta, and the oldest guy among the top-6 on the blue line is 25.
And yes, the difference between the youth and veterans is noticeable. Just ask alternate captain Jussi Jokinen, who’s 33.
“They don’t have kids,” he says of his youthful teammates. “And they play more PlayStation than me.”
On the ice, it means veterans like Jokinen, Rinne and captain Mikko Koivu are in leadership roles that are more important than ever, though the 30-somethings are quick to point out they’re not the only ones teaching.
“They try to pick my brain, how to do certain things on the power play, stuff like that,” Jokinen says. “But I can learn from them, too. They are so young—they are full of energy, so you can get energy from them. And how skilled they are, you can learn some things, too.”
Adds Rinne: “Sometimes it’s good for an older guy who’s maybe gotten used to some things. It gives you a new perspective. I try to take that from those guys.”
In return, the 33-year-old says he leads by example on the ice. And, Rinne adds, “I take them out for dinner.”
All the youth on the roster means this is a different Team Finland than we’ve seen in past years on the international stage.
“We don’t have those old guys who’ve been here for 15 years, like [Kimmo] Timonen,” says Maatta, who helped Finland win Olympic bronze in 2014 as a 19-year-old.
“It’s going to be a challenge for us for sure, with those guys gone. But I think we all take pride in it. We play for Team Finland—we play the way we always do. It’s exciting times.”
Most of the younger players have NHL and big game international experience already under their belts.
And, as Teuvo Teravainen aptly points out: “A lot of our young guys have won something already, so that’s a good thing.” The 22-year-old won the Stanley Cup in his rookie season with Chicago.
Though there are some new faces, chemistry isn’t hard to come by since many of the Finns skate together over the summer back at home, and a lot of them have been playing together in the national team program since they were U-18s.
“I’ve played with half of this team since junior,” Maatta says. “You know everybody before you come here and it’s easy to get together and you can talk to anybody. You can go to Mikko and ask anything really, as a young guy. And it goes both ways.
“For Team Finland that’s always our strength: We’re a team. We don’t have any groups.”
The youngest guy on the team, 18-year-old Laine, is the reigning MVP of the world championship, the second overall pick in the NHL draft, and he’s weeks away from making his debut as a Winnipeg Jet. Right now, his focus is on his World Cup debut.
“I don’t think our age matters,” Laine says. “We know what kind of team we are, what kind of team we want to be. We don’t need anybody else other than this group of guys.
“We have a lot of young guys, yes, but we know how to play the game. I think we’re gonna be fine.”
Laine pauses briefly, and then he adds: “We just need to score more goals than the other team and then we’re gonna win.”
Some kids, it seems, are wise beyond their years.
