Topi Jaakola

Topi Jaakola
Date of birth	November 15, 1983
place of birth	Oulu , Finland
size	186 cm
Weight	87 kg
position	defender
number	# 9
Shot hand	Left
Draft
NHL Entry Draft	2002 , 5th round, 134th position Florida Panthers
Career stations
2000-2008	Kärpät Oulu
2008-2010	Södertälje SK
2010–2012	Luleå HF
2012-2013	Amur Khabarovsk
2013-2014	HC Lev Prague
2014-2017	Jokerit Helsinki
2017-2018	HV71
2019-2020	Pelicans
since 2020	ZSC Lions

Topi Jaakola (born November 15, 1983 in Oulu ) is a Finnish ice hockey player who has been under contract with the ZSC Lions in the National League since February 2020 .

Career

Topi Jaakola already played in the junior division for Kärpät Oulu , for whose professional team he made his debut in the SM-liiga in the 2000/01 season . In the NHL Entry Draft 2002 he was selected in the fifth round as a total of 134th player by the Florida Panthers , for which he however never played. In his eight years at Kärpät, the defender and the team won the championship title in the SM-liiga four times in 2004, 2005, 2007 and 2008 , was runner-up in 2003 and third in 2006. In addition, he reached the final of the IIHF European Champions Cup twice with Kärpät in 2005 and 2006 , with the team losing to the two Russian representatives HK Awangard Omsk and HK Dynamo Moscow .

Topi Jaakola (left) and Pawel Dazjuk , November 2012

In summer 2008 Jaakola left the club and signed a contract with Södertälje SK in the Swedish Elitserien . In Södertälje he played two seasons and managed to get the league with the team in the Kvalserien before Jaakola received a contract with Luleå HF for the 2010/11 season .

In the 2012/13 season he played for Amur Khabarovsk in the Continental Hockey League , before moving to HC Lev Prague in May 2013 within the league . With Lev Prague he reached the KHL playoff final in 2014. After this success, the club withdrew from the league for financial reasons and Jaakola moved to Helsinki to the new KHL participant Jokerit . There he was under contract until the end of the 2016/17 season, then he was signed by HV71 from Svenska Hockeyligan .

At the beginning of the 2018/19 season he was under contract with TPS Turku, but was only able to play one game for TPS due to an injury and was sacked in October 2018. In June 2019, he received a contract with the Pelicans Lahti before moving to the ZSC Lions from the National League in February 2020 .

International

For Finland , Jaakola took part in the 2001 U18 World Junior Championships and the 2002 and 2003 U20 World Junior Championships . In all three tournaments he won the bronze medal with his team. In 2011 he won the gold medal at the World Cup with the men's national team . In 2016 he won the silver medal at the world championship .

Achievements and Awards

2003 Finnish runner-up with Kärpät Oulu 2004 Finnish champion with Kärpät Oulu 2005 Finnish champion with Kärpät Oulu 2005 2nd place at the IIHF European Champions Cup with Kärpät Oulu

2006 2nd place at the IIHF European Champions Cup with Kärpät Oulu 2007 Finnish champion with Kärpät Oulu 2008 Finnish champion with Kärpät Oulu

International

• 2001 bronze medal at the U18 Junior World Championship
• 2002 bronze medal at the U20 World Junior Championship
• 2003 bronze medal at the U20 World Junior Championship
• 2011 gold medal at the world championship
• 2016 silver medal at the world championship

Web links

• Topi Jaakola at hockeydb.com (English)
• Topi Jaakola at eliteprospects.com (English)