Estimated read time: 3-4 minutes
SALT LAKE CITY — Utah Hockey Club defenseman Olli Määttä and Juuso Välimäki won't be getting much of a break this February.
But they are more than fine with that.
Määttä and Välimäki were both named to Team Finland for the 4 Nations Face-off. The seven-game round-robin tournament will feature teams from the United States, Canada, Sweden and Finland and will be played from Feb. 12-20 in Montreal and Boston.
"I didn't realize how big it is until kind of right now," Välimäki said. "You got all these interviews and all these announcements online — I didn't really realize it."
There is plenty of excitement around the tournament, which will take place over the usual All-Star break window. It will be the first time that countries will field teams of NHL players since the 2016 World Cup.
NHL players last played in the Olympic games in 2014 in Sochi — but will once again compete in 2026 and 2030. So the 4 nations will provide a small preview for the next Olympics.
"I think these are awesome moments. I think the last one must have been the World Cup, that we have best on best, and it's been a while," Määttä said. "So I think we as players, we're excited. I'm sure the hockey world's excited too."
Määttä and Välimäki are no strangers to putting on their homeland's sweaters, either.
Määttä played for Finland in the 2014 Olympics and the 2016 World Cup, along with competing in various International Ice Hockey Federation World Championships. Meanwhile, Välimäki has skated in multiple IIHF World Championships and even captained Finland's gold medal-winning under-18 team in 2016.
"It's amazing. It's an honor," Välimäki said. "I did it for many years, kind of growing up with U16, all the way through World Juniors. And it's always been one of those big goals to represent my country in the big stages. And obviously, this is pretty much as big as it gets as of now."
Utah head coach André Touringy only sees positives to having players take part in the tournament.
"I think it's good for our organization, in a selfish way, in the sense that those guys will have the opportunity to play really important games, do or die," he said. "The more you play those games, the more you learn to play under pressure, learn about yourself, learn how to prepare."
But, as Määttä made clear, those games are in the future. For now, he's worried about the task at hand: helping Utah win games.
"Obviously you're happy about it, pretty excited, but I think you don't want to get too ahead of yourself because we got a lot of things we're working on here," said Määttä, who was traded to Utah last month. "We've got a good thing going on."
Each country is allowed 23 players per team, all of which must come from the NHL.
Utah Hockey Club forward Matias Maccelli, the other Finnish player on Utah's roster, was left off Team Finland. After a strong 2023-24 season Maccelli looked to have shored up a spot, but he has scored just 10 points (three goals, seven assists) through 25 games this year.
Utah captain Clayton Keller (USA) and forward Kevin Stenlund (Sweden) were also in the mix for their respective countries but neither made a team.
"If you have no adversity in life, you're probably living in a unicorn world, because that's not happening," Tourigny said. "You have adversity, and you need to be able to battle through and react to it."
