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YOUTH SERVES AVS WELL IN RUN TO CUP
Tuesday, June 12, 2001

Source: By Derrick Goold
News Staff Writer

Like many foreign players before him, Colorado Avalanche forward Ville Nieminen found the best way to communicate when he first arrived to play hockey in this country was by parroting his English-speaking teammates.

The way they congratulated each other was the way he congratulated them.
Whatever they ordered at restaurants, he ordered.

His mimicking of English had mixed results. Often, after he repeated a teammate's order, came the tough questions:

"Salad?''

"Medium.''

"Dressing?''

"Diet Coke.''

Imitation also was Nieminen's strategy entering his first NHL playoffs and his first Stanley Cup Finals. Follow the veterans. See how they prepare. Do what they do. And, as usual, say what they say.

Yet it was his quirky improvisations that helped invigorate and spark the Avalanche to its second championship in six years. Nieminen and fellow under-25 teammates Dan Hinote, Martin Skoula, Chris Dingman, Chris Drury and Game 7 standout Alex Tanguay brought needed energy and exhilaration to the vets' quest.

As they raced around the ice, all fresh legs and youthful vigor, they opened a window on the Avalanche's future.

Not Generation X. But Generation Next.

(...) Talent trained by the best, Hartley said. Hinote said he learned a lot about handling defensive pressure from watching Sakic early in the Finals, not only on the ice but in the locker room.

"There is no other school like us,'' Hartley said.

At the Avalanche's minor league Hershey locker room, there is a picture of the Stanley Cup. Nieminen started this season at Hershey, chatting as best he could with his teammates about someday being with the big club and winning a Cup. There was no mention of it coming so soon for him or for the others.

"There's been lots of pressure time, lots of experience time,'' Nieminen said. "That's a good thing for us to learn from. If
something is going to fail for us in (the) next years, we can still look back to this and know the confidence we played with now.''

(...) Much of the Stanley Cup Finals spotlight was focused on the Colorado Avalanche's veterans, but it took youth - like Alex
Tanguay scoring one playoff point for every year he has been alive (21) - to serve those vets and bring home the Cup. The postseason contributions of the Avalanche kids, all younger than 25 (Steven Reinprecht and Milan Hejduk just missed the list, having recently turned 25):

Name.............Birthdate........GP.....G.....A.....P....+/-....PIM

Alex Tanguay.....Nov.21, 1979....23.....6....15....21....13......8

Martin Skoula....Oct.28, 1979....23.....1.....4.....5.....1......8

Ville Nieminen...Apr..6, 1977....23.....4.....6....10....-1.....20

Dan Hinote.......Jan.30, 1977....23.....2.....4.....6.....4.....21

Chris Drury......Aug.20, 1976....23....11.....5....16.....5......4

Chris Dingman....Jul..6, 1976....16.....0.....4.....4.....3.....14

Ville Nieminen becomes fifth Finnish Stanley Cup winner

From farm team to NHL champion

Helsingin Sanomat
Monday 11.6.2001

In the early hours of Sunday morning Finnish time, Ville Nieminen of the Colorado Avalanche became the fifth Finnish ice hockey player to win the NHL's most coveted trophy, the Stanley Cup. Colorado finally overcame the New Jersey Devils in the seventh and decisive game of the final, winning 3-1.

Nieminen made no effort to conceal his emotions as the latest Finnish owner of a traditional Stanley Cup gold ring. "This is quite definitely the greatest moment of my life so far. If you believe enough in what you are doing and you try to work at 100% all the time, then some day the work gets rewarded. That day came for me today. Naturally it feels pretty strange that everything happened to fall into place in my first season in the League", confided Nieminen to the Finnish News Agency.

The winger scored four goals and six assists during Colorado's play-offs campaign, and can be well satisfied with his rookie season in the NHL, although his delight at lifting the trophy after the final match was tempered by the fact that his father, himself a former player and instrumental in Ville's choice of career, was not there to see the moment. Nieminen's father died three years ago and never saw his son playing hockey at the highest level.

The Colorado Avalanche triumph will mean celebrations this summer in Tampere, Nieminen's home town, as it is customary for the players on the winning team to be allowed to show off the Stanley Cup trophy to the folks at home. This is the first time a Tampere player has had a chance to bring home the cup.

Previous Finnish Stanley Cup medallists are Jari Kurri (five times with Edmonton Oilers, 1984, 1985, 1987, 1988, 1990), Esa Tikkanen (four times with the Oilers in 1985, 1987, 1988,and 1990, and once with the New York Rangers in 1994), Reijo Ruotsalainen (twice with the Oilers in 1987 and 1990), and Jere Lehtinen, who was in the victorious Dallas Stars team in 1999.

An earlier weekly article throws some light on Ville Nieminen's humble beginnings in the North American hockey leagues, where he went as an unknown 20-year-old.

Rookie he may be in the NHL, but he is no stranger to hockey over the Atlantic. On his arrival in 1997 he was consigned to the junior farm leagues for three and a half years - a lifetime and a half for most. Despite the claims of those who said he would return to Tampere with his tail between his legs, Nieminen stuck it out and learnt his trade, and now he can enjoy the benefits - and perhaps a tiny sense of "he who laughs last laughs longest".