A 17-year old Joel Armia has started his SM-liiga career by storm; 5gp 2g+2a=4p. He's eligible in 2011 NHL Draft and is starting to look like a likely first round pick.
I assume he'll continue his strong international career as a member of the Under 20 Finnish team this year in Buffalo?
If he continues playing like he has for the five first games and continues getting icetime in the 1-2 lines he will be Finland's next first rounder (I would seriously doupt 30 other youngsters would have more interest than Armia at that point after a solid year in SM-liiga from this 17-year old, 6'4 tall attacker with great skills and a right-handed shot), we would only have to worry about how high would he go in the first round.This.
This.
This.
This.
If he continues like this, he will be chosen to WJC and after that he might be Finland's next first round pick.
EDIT: This is Chris Gibson?
I really think the injury Pulkkinen suffored the year just before the draft was the big factor why he fell in it, even though to us Finns the hugeness of the drop was almost pretty funny. It would be just mind-boggling, if he would stay healthy the whole season and continues his good play and just being solid in SM-liiga and A-juniors (knock on wood) and still would fall like crazy. Well anything is possible in the draft.I believe he will be in U20 WJC team. Huge size, sniper, right, soft hands... Let's hype like mid first rounder and see Armia going in 4th round like Pulkkinen
He already has more points than Pulu did in his draft season. And Armia is like 20 cm taller.Let's hype like mid first rounder and see Armia going in 4th round like Pulkkinen
It's good to see Perhonen (great name for a butterfly goalie ) doing so well after the difficult season he had last year. The kid definately has potential; great size, awareness and quickness.Another Finnish '11 Draft-prospect to watch this season is JyP goalie Samu Perhonen. Central scouting's director of European scouting Göran Stubb seems to be very high on this kid.
Born in march -93, he has good size (6'03) and has started the season with JYP U20-team very well.
http://www.eliteprospects.com/player.php?player=43533
It'll be interesting to see which goalies will be chosen to U18 National team for the upcoming 4 nations tournament next month. Ullberg's status as a number one goaltender might be in danger by the good start that Perhonen and Edelmann have had.
Name|DOB|H.|lbs.|L/R|Team|GPI|GAA|Pct
Mikael Edelmann|01-JUN-93|6'0|154|L|Tappara Jr.A|5|1.79|0.939|
Samu Perhonen|07-MAR-93|6'3|161|L|JYP Jr.A|6|2.86|0.911|
Richard Ullberg|16-JUL-93|6'3|176|L|HIFK Jr.A|2|3.53|0.857|
And a fine pass it was on the only goal of the match: http://www.nelonen.fi/ohjelmat/sm-l...an-erikoiset-haastattelut?vt=video&vid=103895He has an assist today against Blues.
0+1 so far in tonights game against Tappara, 3 minutes only played
It is good that Finland is back on the track on producing bigger players. We had a period when people thought that Saku Koivu is the prototype of future hockey player and teams started to favor stamina over size/strength. Jesper Kokkonen is another name to keep in mind.