Lasse Oksanen

Lasse Oksanen ( born December 7, 1942 in Tampere ) is a retired Finnish professional ice hockey player and coach who played during his active career mainly for Ilves Tampere and with this three times won the Finnish championship. In addition, he was a longtime member of the Finnish national team.

Career

Lasse Oksanen played from 1960 to 1975, from 1977 to 1979 and from 1980 to 1982 in his parent club Ilves Tampere. During the 1960/61 season the Finn had for Ilves in the Finnish top league, the SM- sarja debuts. In the following two seasons, he also went parallel for the junior team of Ilves on the ice, took part with the Oksanen at the Finnish Championship. 1962 won Oksanen with Ilves for the first time in his career, the Finnish Championship. In the season 1963/64, he then achieved a breakthrough in the first team, as the right winger scored 23 points in 17 league games. Only his strike partner Jorma Peltonen, also a Ilves legend was successful. His good performances at Ilves brought him in consequence a permanent nomination in the Finnish national team, which Oksanen first time represented at the Olympic Winter Games in 1964. Overall, he took for Finland from 1964 to 1977 in eleven world championships and three Olympic tournaments and brought it to his home country to 282 internationals. In Ilves, he held the post of team captain for several years.

In addition to two further league titles with Ilves, the Oksanen 1966 and 1972 won, numerous individual successes and honors were not enough. He also was runner-up four times with Ilves, reaching five times the third. After the 1964/65 season, he was first elected to the All-Star team the SM- sarja. Same succeeded him eight more times and thereby to 1972, eight times in a row. In 1966 he was honored as a Finnish player of the year. When Hockey European Cup 1966/67, Oksanen reached the finals with Ilves and shot there for two matches against the Czechoslovak champion TJ ZKL Brno in the ultimately lost finals series. In 1968, the Finn Raimo - Kilpiö the trophy as the fairest player of the year. In the season 1969/70 he scored seven hat-tricks in the Finnish Championship. This created Oksanen in just 22 games. Although nowadays much more games are played, this record has so far remained untouched. In 1975, he left his hometown club for the first time and decided on an engagement with the Italian club HC Gherdeina. DC in his debut season won Oksanen with the Val Gardena the Italian championship and Oksanen was involved with 27 goals on the title. In the 1976/77 season he was active as a player-manager of the Val Gardena.

In 1977 he returned to Ilves, for which he ran aground two years. In 1979 he moved to Italy again and this time after Veneto Asiago Hockey. After one season he again went back to Ilves to still linger there for two seasons and to end his playing career in 1983 after an engagement at Koo -Vee. In the highest Finnish League the striker came in the course of his career on a total of 477 missions and 498 points (268 goals and 230 assists ). His jersey number 14 has been banned from Ilves and more forgiving to any player. As an assistant coach, he worked during the 1994/95 season with his long-time home club Ilves.

Oksanen 1987 was inducted into the Finnish Hockey Hall of Fame. In 1999 followed his admission into the IIHF Hall of Fame. The Leave - Oksanen trophy, which is awarded by the SM - liiga annually to the best player of the season, was named after him in 1994.

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