Jere Lehtinen has had the opportunity to see the Hungarian national team play twice against Finland the past two year. Once in Russia at the A-Pool World Championships and once this past spring as both teams were preparing for the World Championships. The former Stanley Cup and World Champion started out his career in the Finnish development program under the hands of Jarmo Tolvanen when Tolvanen worked with the U17, U18 and U20 programs.
“When he worked with youth and junior players who showed what they had he always gave everyone a chance. He showed authority but was really good with the younger players. He was open and let them get close to him, but still knew when to keep the distance to do his job, he was able to find that good balance, all good coaches need this. Coaches need to be able to communicate with their players they need to know when to be be close but also know the situations when to be strict and be an authority figure. Jarmo really knows how to do this” said Lehtinen when asked what was his experience with Tolvanen.
Tolvanen has coached at a number of levels in Finland both at the adult and junior levels, with club and country. “He was coaching my hometown team before he made it to the national team program, we had a good group of players who played for him in the youth system who all had long and successful careers, so his name is well known in Finland.” said the former Dallas Stars forward when ask about Tolvanen’s reputation in Finland. “Hockey people in Finland know who he is and they know who coached where in the 1990s. If you talk about people like me, Saku Koivu and Villi Peltonen, he put us together in the U20 games and we won a good number of games in 1993 so people will remember him for a long time.”
The question on everyone’s mind is how will a presumably Finnish style of hockey work when Hungary has had Canadian coaches since the early 2000s. Naturally Pat Cortina, Ted Sator, Kevin Primeau and Rich Chernomaz did not all have the exact same style however they were all North American. Jere Lehtonen believes that this will not be an issue because a coach with the resume that Tolvanen has, he has been able to be flexible and managed to adapt to what the team had to offer. “I am certain he will help Hungary, I am not familiar with how the youth and junior teams are playing like in Hungary but from what I saw two years ago at the World Championships in Russia and also what I saw in Budapest this past spring I think that he can handle the players and he will be able to coach Hungary. He can adjust and also mix styles, you can’t build a resume like what he has without being able to work with others styles and being able to adapt. You need to mix your style with what is there. I think he is a good choice for Hungary.”
