Great parable about Saku Koivu’s Aatos boy: “Come from the bush”

– Quitting is never an easy thing. I am very happy that I have found a so-called second career. I get to keep busy with my beloved sport, turning 50 today Fredrik Norrena rejoices.

The former top molar has determinedly moved towards the position of head coach and is now piloting the TPS U20 team for the third season.

– I have been able to work under good head coaches who have given me a role. It has made this growth possible, he thanks.

– I have found a new passion, and I am just as goal-oriented as I am as a player. The goal is to get back to the professional level, and I’m very close to that now.

Two different seasons

Norrena aims to be the head coach at the highest adult level possible, that is, in Finland, the SM league.

He has given evidence by coaching to the top spot in the TPS U20 Championship series after two bronze medals in the Championship.

– This is a really great age to coach: you can influence young people and create a good foundation for a professional career and for life in general.

– At the same time, this is a demanding phase, when the amount of practice and games is heavy. It takes a committed group, and we have that.

The start of the season was, however, mentally difficult for the people of Turku.

– Our respected academy coach Timo Hirvonen slept off the rest of the summer. Yes, it affected us, and August was really challenging in every way.

– However, the series got off to a good start, and the players’ self-confidence has grown. The team has a strong need to achieve. Let’s keep that flame burning and this could be a really good season.

– This A series is interesting in the sense that it’s like playing two different seasons, Norrena reminds and brings up spring 2015, for example, when TPS last won the U20 championship.

Norrena was the team’s goalkeeper coach at the time.

– The regular season is its own thing, and after that a lot depends on how the league teams do. Power relations can change quickly.

From those league teams whose games do not continue long into the playoff spring, players will be released as reinforcements for the U20 team.

– Then 2015 the same as Mikko Rantanen came to us for the rest of the season, and also had league experience Alexander Georgiev was at the finish line.

Today, both represent the Colorado Avalanche in the NHL.

– Even in this group, we have mahiks for anything, Norrena underlines.

Puck families

In the TPS U20 lineup, there are glimpses of familiar surnames.

– I am in a special situation when I get to coach the children of surprisingly many old teammates, Norrena laughs.

– Fortunately, they are very goal-oriented and forward-looking. It’s a pleasure to coach them.

Keeper Go to Niittymä mixed Rene Nummelin, Aatos Koivun, Kasper Pikkarainen and already more for playing on the League side Emil Hemming’s for the time being, the first names of the more famous fathers are in the corresponding order Antero, Peter, Saku, Ilkka and Jonas.

There are also hockey family members I’m hijacking brother Konsta Kakko mixed Akin nephew Atte Uusikartano.

A terrible comparison

Aatos Koivu made headlines at the beginning of November, when he made his debut in a lion shirt in the Finnish under-18 national team.

– He is becoming a very good player, a bit different from his father Saku and his father’s brother Mikko. He is a finisher with a very good shot, Norrena characterizes Aatos and then rattles off a great comparison.

– In terms of player profile, Aatos is closer to Ovechkin than Saku.

Alexander Ovechkin38, is the NHL’s nine-time leading scorer.

– Aatoks has the same puck skills and understanding of the game as Saku, but if his father was a passer and last but not least a playmaker, then Aatoks also has that finishing skill.

Of course, the junior is still far from the achievements of his father and Ovechkin, and his dimensions (180 cm, 75 kg) do not resemble the bear-like Russian legend. However, it is easy to see the similarities when explosive onetimer goes accurately with the right stick.

– Aatos has developed a little later than others his age. He was small and therefore a bit weak, but now he can fight quite believably. A big physical growth and development has taken place within a year, Norrena says.

– She is late bloomer, if you can say that about a 17-year-old. He has come out of the box a bit and has developed very quickly in the last six months.

New boost

Of the four championships won in the ranks of TPS, Norrena takes the first one to the top.

– Of course it is -95. I was young and nowhere near a ready molar, but I had a great shot and the ability to play in a tough spot anyway. The young team won that championship, he remembers the final series, where the people of Turku defeated the Jokers with a 3–2 victory.

– I also remember the fourth one, i.e. 2001. I had quite a lot of injuries between those championships. There had been time for disappointment and questioning, but only 13 goals were scored in ten matches in the playoffs. Of course it was thanks to a good defense, but I also proved to myself that I can do this.

– It brought a new boost to my entire final career. From then on, I also played really strong seasons abroad: in Sweden, in the NHL and KHL, as well as in the national team. That’s when I really got to the top. I was much more mature and a better molar than I was in ’95.

Tough colleagues

Norrena became the Swedish champion in the spring of 2003. For Västra Frölunda, the championship was the first in 48 years.

– The whole town was confused, Norrena updates.

– It was a very challenging season for me. I started there as a pure first molar, and then there was a young and quite talented person maturing there Henrik Lundqvisthe refers to the New York Rangers legend.

– I had competed in Turku Miikka Kiprusoff, Antero to Niittymä and Jani Hurmeen with, and they all became NHL goalies. I wanted out of that situation, and then I was in the same situation in Sweden.

Both Kiprusoff and Lundqvist have been awarded the Vezina Trophy for the NHL’s best goaltender.

– If you wanted to avoid competition for playing time, you could have made a better choice. But it says something that Lundqvist and I both played two final games, he the first two and I the last two, and we beat Färjestad 4–0.

– I have to give credit to my goalkeeper colleagues. Without them, I wouldn’t have done so well, and hopefully I was able to bring something to them with my own competitiveness.

Club history

Norrena’s path also led to the NHL, and in the years 2006–09 he played exactly 100 NHL games for the Columbus Blue Jackets.

In the very first season, he became the first goalkeeper in club history to have a winning record in the regular season: 24 wins and 23 losses.

– I’m really happy that through hard work I finally got there. The starting points in Lepplax’s outdoor troughs were a little different than many others my age, Norrena reminds of her roots in the rural municipality of Pietarsaari.

– When I was still 16 years old, I played second division, i.e. the current Finnish series.

Norrena won the KHL championship in the spring of 2009 after keeping a clean sheet against Kazan in the decisive final match.

– The sad world situation overshadows memories. Despite that, a good image remained of that group and those circumstances. But what was behind it, I won’t speculate, Norrena states, referring to the origin of the funding and the entire league as part of the Kremlin soft power.

– I played injured from the quarter-finals onwards. Then the seventh final at home and won 1–0. It was a big mental victory to be able to fight through it.

Lion spirit

Norrena also played exactly 100 national A matches, including six prestigious competitions.

He remembers his three medals fondly. I remember the spring 2006 World Cup the best.

– Those were the games where I got to play in the first square.

Norrena’s statistics were the best of the games (1.11 and 95.1%). In the bronze medal match, he kept Canada to zero with his 37 saves.

Earlier in the same season, Norrena won Olympic silver for Finland in a tournament where the best NHL players participated.

– That team spirit! Friends of the same age had been together for a long time, he added.

– We played really convincingly. It was a privilege to be a part of it, and I have really warm memories of it.