Växjö Lakers

Växjö Lakers Hockey Club (often referred to as the Växjö Lakers or VLH) is an ice hockey club from Växjö in Sweden. The club plays in the Swedish Hockey League (SHL; formerly Elitserien), the top-level league of Swedish ice hockey, and made its debut there in 2011–12. They play their home games in the Vida Arena. The club won the Swedish national championship in 2015 and 2018.[1]

Växjö Lakers
2019–20 Växjö Lakers season
CityVäxjö, Sweden
LeagueSwedish Hockey League
Founded1997
Home arenaVida Arena
Colors     
General managerHenrik Evertsson
Head coachSam Hallam
Le Mat Trophy2015, 2018

History

The club was founded in 1997, after Växjö HC went bankrupt that year. Växjö Lakers originally played in Växjö Ishall as their home arena, but prior to the 2011–12 season they moved to Vida Arena. The construction of the Vida Arena was finished in summer 2011.

The club began play in the 1997–98 season. Starting in Division 4, four divisions below the Elitserien/SHL, Växjö worked its way to HockeyAllsvenskan within 6 years, being promoted 3 times. With a perfect record in the 2003 HockeyAllsvenskan Kvalserien, the club qualified for HockeyAllsvenskan. Sensationally, during their debut season in HockeyAllsvenskan, the club acquired Shjon Podein, an NHL-merited North American player who played 699 NHL games and won the Stanley Cup with the Colorado Avalanche in 2001. The acquirement was described as "årets värvning" (acquirement of the year) by some people.[2] During Podein's years in Växjö he became a crowd favorite.[3] Prior to the following season, the 2004–05 season, the team also acquired Brad DeFauw, another NHL-merited North American player who played 9 NHL games and 154 AHL games. Both Shjon Podein and Brad DeFauw left the team after the 2004–05 season.

The club would spend 8 seasons in HockeyAllsvenskan and, during that time, reach the Kvalserien qualification for Elitserien three times. Växjö did not manage to promote to Elitserien in the 2009 and 2010 respective Kvalserien qualifications, but after winning the 2010–11 HockeyAllsvenskan season for the first time in club history and earning a third consecutive trip to Kvalserien, Växjö secured promotion to the top-tier league Elitserien in the eighth round (of ten) in the 2011 Kvalserien. The team finished the 2011 Kvalserien with 26 points, which is a record in the Kvalserien history.

The team formerly used red, yellow and blue as its colours, both in the team's logo and the team's jerseys. On 18 April 2011 it was announced that the club had changed the colours of their jerseys to blue and orange prior to the 2011–12 season.[4] At that time it was also announced that the club's logo had been changed to an orange shield containing the name of the club beneath a lion holding a crossbow – an image from the Småland coat of arms.

Elitserien/Swedish Hockey League

The club's first game in the Elitserien league was played on 13 September 2011, losing 0–2 to Frölunda HC in front of an outsold Scandinavium. Two days later, the club historically took their first points in Elitserien, beating Luleå HF on away ice 3–2 in a shootout, despite trailing by two goals in the third period.[5] Their first home game was played on September 17, against Linköpings HC, in front of an outsold Vida Arena. Linköping won the game 4–2. Former Växjö Lakers crowd favorite Shjon Podein watched the game in the arena.[6] Their first home points and regulation-time win came on September 27, when the Lakers won 4–1 against Modo Hockey.[7] The Lakers' first shutout came on away ice when Modo were beaten 2–0 on 25 October 2011.[8]

Växjö Lakers played the first Småland derby game in Elitserien history, which was on away ice against reigning regular-season champions HV71, on 8 October 2011 in front of an outsold Kinnarps Arena—exactly 7,000 spectators—in Jönköping.[9] Växjö Lakers came out on top with a 3–2 victory in a shootout. Växjö Lakers forward Mike Iggulden scored three penalty shot goals in the game, two of them counted in the statistics.[10]

Season-by-season record
Season Level Division Record Avg.
home
atnd.		 Notes
Position W-T-L
W-OT-L
This list features the five most recent completed seasons. For prior seasons, see List of Växjö Lakers seasons.
2014–15 Tier 1 SHL 3rd 24–9–6–16 4,980
Swedish Championship playoffs — 12–6 5,629 Won finals, 4–2 vs Skellefteå AIK
2015–16 Tier 1 SHL 6th 25–4–4–19 4,947
Swedish Championship playoffs — 7–6 5,629 Lost in semifinals, 3–4 vs Skellefteå AIK
2016–17 Tier 1 SHL 1st 26–7–7–12 4,757
Swedish Championship playoffs — 2–4 5,629 Lost in quarterfinals, 2–4 vs Malmö Redhawks
2017–18 Tier 1 SHL 1st 34–6–2–10 4,658
Swedish Championship playoffs — 12–1 5,629 Won finals, 4–0 vs Skellefteå AIK
2018–19 Tier 1 SHL 7th 22–3–10–17 4,691
Eighth-finals — 2–0 4,579 Won 2–0 vs Örebro HK
Swedish Championship playoffs — 1–4 5,223 Lost in quarterfinals, 1–4 vs Luleå HF

Players and personnel

Current roster

Updated 26 July, 2019.[11][12]

# Nat Player Pos S/G Age Acquired Birthplace
44 Peter Andersson D L 29 2017 Kvidinge, Sweden
15 Casey Bailey C/RW R 29 2019 Anchorage, Alaska
49 David Bernhardt D L 23 2019 Huddinge, Sweden
3 Oliver Bohm D L 28 2016 Karlstad, Sweden
9 Marcus Davidsson C L 22 2019 Tyresö, Sweden
17 Jonas Engström LW L 30 2019 Södertälje, Sweden
4 Tim Erixon D L 29 2019 Port Chester, New York, United States
30 Viktor Fasth G L 38 2017 Kalix, Sweden
22 Jakob Forsbacka Karlsson C R 24 2019 Stockholm, Sweden
– Emil Forslund RW R 27 2020 Tidaholm, Sweden
10 Richard Gynge RW R 34 2019 Tyresö, Sweden
29 Pontus Holmberg C L 21 2018 Västerås, Sweden
23 Roman Horák C L 29 2018 České Budějovice, Czechoslovakia
60 Erik Josefsson (A) C L 33 2008 Gislaved, Sweden
– Fredrik Karlström C L 23 2019 Stockholm, Sweden
55 Miika Koivisto D L 30 2019 Vaasa, Finland
27 Martin Lundberg LW L 30 2017 Skellefteå, Sweden
25 Linus Nässén D L 22 2019 Norrtälje, Sweden
77 Pontus Netterberg RW R 28 2016 Varberg, Sweden
41 Ludvig Nilsson C L 26 2019 Stockholm, Sweden
14 Emil Pettersson C L 27 2019 Sundsvall, Sweden
48 Daniel Rahimi (A) D L 33 2017 Umeå, Sweden
– Robert Rosén C R 33 2020 Alvesta, Sweden
24 Brendan Shinnimin C L 30 2017 East St. Paul, Manitoba, Canada
18 Marcus Sylvegård RW R 21 2019 Gessie, Sweden

Team captains

Honored members
Växjö Lakers retired numbers
No. Player Position Career No. retirement
14Stefan NilssonF1990–1991, 1997–2003–
38Johan MarkussonRW2005–2014–

Franchise records and leaders

Scoring leaders

These are the top-ten point-scorers of the Växjö Lakers since their promotion to the SHL in the 2011–12 season. Figures are updated after each completed season.[13]

Note: Pos = Position; GP = Games Played; G = Goals; A = Assists; Pts = Points; P/G = Points per game;   = current Växjö Lakers player

Points
PlayerPosGPGAPtsP/G
Robert RosénC29688113201.68
Liam ReddoxLW3867278150.39
Tuomas KiiskinenLW2065872130.63
Cory MurphyD2082889117.56
Tomi KallioRW2044373116.57
Erik JosefssonC405504393.23
Dennis RasmussenC156414687.56
Linus FröbergC208285583.40
Noah WelchD164195473.44
Brendan ShinniminC92313667.73

Trophies and awards

Team

Le Mat Trophy

  • 2014–15, 2017–18

Individual

Coach of the Year

  • Sam Hallam: 2017–18

Honken Trophy

Rookie of the Year

References
  1. Anders Feltenmark (24 April 2015). "Växjö Lakers HC svenska mästare" (in Swedish). Swedish Ice Hockey Association. Retrieved 31 October 2015.
  2. "Änderson om avund" (in Swedish). LakersLakejer.net. 2003-11-04. Retrieved 2011-06-25.
  3. "Shjon Podein har landat i Växjö" (in Swedish). Sveriges Radio'. 2004-10-19. Retrieved 2011-06-25.
  4. "Orange revolution i Växjö Lakers" (in Swedish). Smålandsposten. 2011-04-18. Archived from the original on 2012-07-22. Retrieved 2011-04-21.
  5. Jonas Gustavsson (2011-09-15). "Kallio fixade historisk vinst" (in Swedish). Växjö Lakers Hockey. Retrieved 2011-09-15.
  6. Jonas Gustavsson (2011-09-16). "Invigningsöverraskningen: Podein på plats i VIDA Arena" (in Swedish). Växjö Lakers Hockey. Retrieved 2011-09-16.
  7. Jonas Gustavsson (2011-09-27). "Första segern i VIDA Arena". Växjö Lakers Hockey. Retrieved 2011-10-02.
  8. Jonas Gustavsson (2011-10-25). "Seger – och första nollan" (in Swedish). Växjö Lakers Hockey. Retrieved 2011-10-25.
  9. Bosse Johander (2011-10-08). "Historiskt derby i Småland" (in Swedish). Sveriges Radio. Retrieved 2011-10-08.
  10. Per Johansson (2011-10-08). "Iggulden straffade HV71 i smålandsderbyt" (in Swedish). Växjö Lakers Hockey. Retrieved 2011-10-08.
  11. "Växjö Lakers roster" (in Swedish). Växjö Lakers. 2019-06-05. Retrieved 2019-06-05.
  12. "Eliteprospects.com - Växjö Lakers". Eliteprospects.com. Retrieved 2019-06-05.
  13. "Växjö Lakers - All Time SHL leaders". quanthockey.com. 2019-05-31. Retrieved 2019-05-31.
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