Tappara has won 18 Finnish league titles, the first being 1959 and the last in 2022. On this year's squad there are two Canadians - Geoff Platt and Ben Thomas.
Platt is from Toronto. Before playing in Europe he played in the National Hockey League with the Anaheim Ducks and the Columbus Blue Jackets. He then spend five years in the Kontinental Hockey League with Dinamo Minsk, Lokomotiv Yaroslavl, and CSKA Moscow. While playing in Minsk, he accepted Belarusian citizenship. He first played for Belarus in international play in 2014. He played for Ilves, the Växjö Lakers, and now Tappara.
Ben Thomas was drafted by the Tampa Bay Lightning in 2014. he played five seasons in the American Hockey League before finally getting 5 games with Tampa Bay. He moved to Sweden in 2021 to play for Leksands IF, Växjö Lakers, and now Tappara.
Ilves has won 16 Finnish league championships, the first being 1936 and the last in 1985. They have one Canadian on the roster - Barrett Hayton from Kitchener.
Hayton was drafted 5th overal in the 2018 draft by Arizona. He played 20 games in the National Hockey League in 2019-20. He started with Ilves in 2020-21, but returned to Arizona to play 14 games with the Coyotes, and 26 with Arizon's farm team, Tucson. In 2021-22 he played 60 games with Arizona picking up 10 goals and 14 assists.
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