Tappara three-peats in Finland

For the third year in a row, for the fifth time in the last eight completed seasons, and for the 20th time ever, Tappara from Tampere is the hockey champion of Finland. This season, Tappara finished first overall in the Liiga regular season and defeated the Lahti Pelicans in five games in the finals.

“I am incredibly happy for the players and the organization. I'm super proud to be a part of this,” said Tappara’s Swedish coach Rikard Grönborg told Vesa Winberg of yle.fi. “I came here to learn about Tappara's culture of winning and I learned so much from everyone. An incredible organization.”

The title was clinched with a 3-0 win before 12,700 fans at Nokia Arena. Christian Heljanko made 30 saves for his third shutout of the post-season. The Tappara goalie was named playoff MVP.

“I have great respect for Christian Heljanko,” said Grönborg. “He gave us a chance to win every game.”

“Everything changed quite a lot for this year,” Heljanko told Jussi Paasi of yle.fi. “Basically, we started from scratch. The result was always good, but we didn’t always play that well.”

The title-clinching game was also Heljanko’s last with Tappara. One of his rumoured destinations for next season is Swedish club Brynäs, which has just been promoted back to the SHL.

“Eight years, I never would have believed how much this club will mean to me, how much I will get here,” Heljanko said while choking up. “I’m going to miss you. I hope someday I can come back.”

Two players – forwards Veli-Matti Savinainen and Otto Rauhala – have been on all five of Tappara’s recent championship teams. This is actually the sixth Finnish title for 38-year-old Savinainen, who also won with Ässät in 2013.