Development camp: Taking a chance on Jarventie's offensive instincts

CRANBERRY, Pa. -- Forward Emil Jarventie was at home in Finland watching Day 2 of the NHL Draft when he saw his name come across the screen.

It had been several hours and the seventh round was coming to a close. There were only eight picks remaining in the draft. Finally, the screen showed "217. Emil Jarventie" next to the Penguins' logo, drawing cheers from Jarventie's family and friends who gathered with him.

"It was incredible," Jarventie recalled while at the Penguins' development camp earlier this month. "It was incredible when I saw my name on the TV. It was a moment I'll never forget."

Two days later, Jarventie was at the Lemieux Complex for the start of the Penguins' development camp. The camp didn't go quite as planned for Jarventie, but he still called it an "incredible" experience.

The Penguins' development camp lasted three days this year -- two days of practices followed by a three-on-three tournament at the end. Jarventie and the other Finn drafted in the seventh round this year, defenseman Kalle Kangas, weren't able to participate in the on-ice portion for the first two days of camp. Their hockey bags, which had all of their equipment and personal belongings for the trip, were lost by the airline on the flight over. A quick trip to the nearby Target on Day 1 got them all the personal items and clothes they'd need for their time in Pittsburgh, but there wasn't much to do about the lost equipment other than wait and hope.

Both players' bags turned up that Sunday night, on the eve of the tournament to close camp. Jarventie played for Team Stevens, the winners of the tournament:

ANDI PERELMAN / PENGUINS

Team Stevens, Michele Briere Cup champions. Emil Jarventie is second from the left in the bottom row.

Jarventie was one of the standouts in those games, mostly for his speed and his shot. He scored a goal in his team's first preliminary game to take a 2-1 lead, a game in which his team later won after nine rounds of a shootout:

"My strengths are in the offensive zone," the 18-year-old Jarventie told me during camp. "I'm a good skater, I'm good with the puck."

Asked what parts of his game he wants to focus on improving the most, Jarventie pointed to his defensive game and just the little details in his overall game. That tracks with what Penguins director of amateur scouting Nick Pryor said at the draft of Jarventie. He's a raw prospect, but he's got the offensive skill to make him an interesting project.

"He's an undersized (5-10, 168) winger, offensive-minded," Pryor said of Jarventie. "He can really shoot the puck and is really good in the offensive zone. For him, it's going to be about rounding out the other parts of his game. But we felt that the point where we got him that it was good to take a chance on a guy that had offensive instincts and an offensive part of his game that we were really attracted to."

Jarventie said that he grew up watching Sidney Crosby, Evgeni Malkin and Patrick Kane, and these days enjoys watching the Coyotes' Finnish second-year pro Matias Maccelli. He was a little starstruck being in the Penguins' locker room those first two days. Crosby's usual stall was set up with his gear, and Jarventie called it "incredible" just being in the same room as Crosby's equipment.

Reaching the NHL was always the goal for him growing up, and getting drafted is something both his father Martti and older brother Roby got to experience as well. Roby is a forward who was a 2020 second-round pick of the Senators and played the last two seasons in the AHL. Their father Martti retired in 2016 after a 22-year professional career as a defenseman primarily in the top Finnish league, Liiga. He was also a fourth-round pick of the Canadiens in 2001, and he spent a year in North America in which he played one game for the Canadiens and 59 games for Montreal's AHL affiliate.

"We're still waiting for the little one," said Jarventie, referring to his 14-year-old brother Max. "I hope he gets (drafted) too."

Jarventie credited growing up in those Liiga locker rooms with his dad and brothers as being a big part of why he is where he is today.

"My two brothers, we were in competition with everything we do when we were kids," Jarventie said. "But it was nice to be around my dad when he played, with my brothers in the locker room after the games. He helped us every day, whatever we needed. Training in the summers, he does everything with me and my two brothers. So it's awesome to have a dad like that."

Getting to be in those Liiga locker rooms himself full-time is Jarventie's biggest goal in the immediate future.

Jarventie played all over Finland last year -- 15 games in the top Finnish league with the club SaiPa, 19 games with KOOVEE in the second-tier professional league, and 21 games with Ilves in the U20 junior league. Those games with SaiPa and KOOVEE were his first experiences playing against grown men in a professional league.

He had no trouble producing at the junior level, with eight goals and 11 assists in 21 games. That production dropped off in the professional leagues, with one goal in his 15 games in the top league, and four goals and three assists in 19 games in the second league. Part of the reason for that is that Jarventie is on the smaller side, at 5 foot 10 and 168 pounds. He's going to need to continue to get stronger to find success at those higher levels.

"I learned new things," Jarventie said of his experience in the top Finnish league. "I learned things that I need to get better at, some things that I need to go to the next level. ... It was one step closer to my dreams."

That dream, of course, is the NHL. As with any seventh-round pick, Jarventie has an uphill battle to get there. But the Penguins are hoping they found a late-round gem with the pick they used to draft Jarventie this summer.