Roope Laavainen (born 23 August 1998) is a Finnish professional

ice hockey Ice hockey (or simply hockey) is a team sport played on ice skates, usually on an Ice rink, ice skating rink with Ice hockey rink, lines and markings specific to the sport. It belongs to a family of sports called hockey. In ice hockey, two o ...

defenceman Defence or defense (in American English) in ice hockey is a player position that is primarily responsible for preventing the opposing team from scoring. They are often referred to as defencemen, D, D-men or blueliners (the latter a reference t ...

who is currently playing for

HPK Hämeenlinnan Pallokerho (HPK) is a professional ice hockey team in the Liiga, the top men's ice hockey league in Finland. Their home ice is the Ritari-areena in Hämeenlinna. HPK was established in 1929. The parent club of the team is HPK Edu ...

of the Finnish

Liiga The SM-liiga (marketed as just Liiga from 2013 on), (Finnish for ''League'') colloquially called the Finnish Elite League in English or FM-ligan in Swedish, is the top professional ice hockey league in Finland. It is one of the six founding leagu ...

. He was selected by the

Chicago Blackhawks The Chicago Blackhawks (spelled Black Hawks until 1986, and known colloquially as the Hawks) are a professional ice hockey team based in Chicago. The Blackhawks compete in the National Hockey League (NHL) as a member of the Central Division i ...

in the fourth round, 119th overall, of the

2017 NHL Entry Draft The 2017 NHL Entry Draft was the 55th NHL Entry Draft. The draft was held on June 23–24, 2017, at the United Center in Chicago, Illinois. The first three selections were Nico Hischier going to the New Jersey Devils, Nolan Patrick going to ...

Playing career

Laavainen played as a youth with Jokerit's U20 team in the Jr. A, prior to his selection to the Blackhawks. He left the Jokerit organization to remain in Finland and sign a three-year contract with HPK of the Liiga on 28 April 2017. During the 2018–19 season, Laavainen registered 2 points in 10 games with HPK before he was loaned for two months to fellow Liiga club,

Mikkelin Jukurit Mikkelin Jukurit is a professional ice hockey team in Liiga, the top tier Finnish ice hockey league. They play in Mikkeli, Finland, at the Kalevankankaan jäähalli (known since 2016 as Ikioma Areena). The team has won 7 Mestis (2nd highest level ...

, on 27 November 2018. Adding 1 assist in 5 games with Jukurit, Laavainen returned to HPK on 8 January 2019.

Career statistics

Awards & honors

References

External links

* 1998 births Living people Chicago Blackhawks draft picks Finnish ice hockey defencemen HPK players Ice hockey people from Helsinki Lempäälän Kisa players Mikkelin Jukurit players TuTo players KooKoo players {{Finland-icehockey-defenceman-stub