In Finland, the saying “Luja tahto vie läpi harmaan kiven” or “A robust will takes you thru the gray stone” has the identical that means as “The place there’s a will there’s a means.” That is true for any hockey participant who hits stretches when issues don’t play out as they hoped. For Carolina Hurricanes ahead Jesperi Kotkaniemi, the 2024-25 season can be a make-or-break marketing campaign to see if he may be the participant the staff believed him to be once they gave him an eight-year, $38.56 million deal in March 2022.
Whereas expectations have been excessive for the third-overall choose within the 2018 NHL Entry Draft, Kotkaniemi can nonetheless carve a path to being price that $4.82 million annual common worth.
Kotkaniemi Should Push By the Gray Stone
After signing his extension in 2022, former Hurricanes basic supervisor Don Waddell famous Kotkaniemi’s potential/ “Jesperi has proven us simply how excessive his ceiling may be by way of his talent and work ethic, and that he’s an awesome match with our younger core,” mentioned Waddell. “He’s nonetheless simply 21 years previous, and we’re assured his position in our group will proceed to develop within the years to come back.”
He had the perfect season of his profession in 2022-23, ending with 18 targets and 43 factors in 82 video games, together with two game-winning targets and three power-play markers. He averaged the second most ice time of his profession with 14:44 and received 51.4% of his faceoffs, the second highest of his profession following 2023-24’s 51.5%.
Associated: 5 Carolina Hurricanes to Look ahead to the 2024-25 Season
Whereas the 2023-24 season was not one to recollect, the 24-year-old Pori, Finland, native is aware of he should be higher this season. Throughout final season’s exit interviews, he didn’t mince phrases: “Fairly sh*tty, total. Powerful 12 months for me… I might have been loads higher. I’ll simply attempt to overlook this 12 months now and concentrate on the following one.” This goes again to “Luja tahto vie läpi harmaan kiven” – he should push by way of the gray stone and forge a path the place he can overcome seasons like these.
Final season, Kotkaniemi completed with 12 targets and 27 factors – his lowest level whole with the Hurricanes – after having a superb 43-point season the 12 months earlier than. This season can be pivotal for him as he enters the third season of his extension. Many rumors surfaced this summer time about groups being within the heart or the opportunity of a buyout. A buyout would final for 12 seasons, courting till 2035-36 at $835,000 per 12 months. However the Hurricanes nonetheless think about the Finnish heart, who’s slated because the second-line heart for head coach Rod Brind’Amour’s staff.
He needs to be paired with winger Martin Necas as soon as once more and presumably newcomer Jack Roslovic until a high-end prospect makes the case to leap right into a top-six position.
Associated: Hurricanes’ Kotkaniemi Can Be Jordan Staal 2.0
Kotkaniemi has a cavalcade of supporters who suppose he may be the participant the Hurricanes took an opportunity on. Some view him as the following Jordan Staal in his defensive fashion of play, and he has proven flashes of being a succesful heart to win face-offs in numerous zones.
Within the staff’s first preseason sport versus the Tampa Bay Lightning on Sept. 24, he received 72.7% of his face-offs. Moreover, after shedding offensive gamers like Teuvo Teräväinen and Stefan Noesen, there might be extra alternatives for Kotkaniemi to realize extra ice time than final season (12:59 in comparison with 14:44 the season earlier than). In a transition season for the ‘Canes, some core gamers can be leaned on extra (Seth Jarvis, Sebastian Aho, Andrei Svechnikov, and Necas), and if he needs to be a kind of gamers, he should have an enormous season.
Hopeful Bounceback Season for Kotkaniemi
The sky is the restrict for Kotkaniemi as he has the potential to be Staal 2.0, and plenty of hope he can be. If he begins the 2024-25 season like he did final October when the staff was struggling, he might have an enormous bounce-back season and rating 40-plus factors for the Hurricanes once more. If he has constant linemates in Necas and whoever is on the second-line left-wing spot, he might actually have a likelihood for a forty five to 50-point marketing campaign. Nonetheless, he can’t have one other down season going into subsequent summer time, or issues might get attention-grabbing for him.
