{"id":477814,"date":"2026-02-28T22:56:13","date_gmt":"2026-02-28T22:56:13","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/477814\/"},"modified":"2026-02-28T22:56:13","modified_gmt":"2026-02-28T22:56:13","slug":"chicago-blackhawks-center-talks-olympics","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/477814\/","title":{"rendered":"Chicago Blackhawks center talks Olympics"},"content":{"rendered":"

DENVER \u2014 A welcome back was in order for Chicago Blackhawks center Teuvo Ter\u00e4v\u00e4inen, who spent the last few weeks in Milan skating for Team Finland at the Winter Olympics<\/a>. He didn\u2019t leave empty-handed, as the Finnish cruised past Slovakia 6-1 in the bronze-medal game, their seventh medal in the last nine Games.<\/p>\n

After a hectic collection of days, it was time to relax and fly back to the States. Unfortunately, that didn\u2019t go as smoothly as the 31-year-old would\u2019ve liked.<\/p>\n

\u201cI (was) stuck in New York, it didn\u2019t really go our way those last couple of flights,\u201d Ter\u00e4v\u00e4inen said.<\/p>\n

As NHL trade deadline looms, Chicago Blackhawks veterans try not \u2018to let the noise creep in\u2019<\/a><\/p>\n<\/p>\n

The bronze medal is on the top of the list of his home-country accolades thus far. He wore the captain\u2019s patch for the gold-medal team in the 2014 IIHF World Junior Championship and played for Finland in the 2016 World Cup of Hockey and the 2018 World Championship.<\/p>\n

He didn\u2019t get much action in the 4 Nations Face-Off last February, skating for minimal ice time before being a healthy scratch in a loss to Canada. He played in Milan, but Nathan Mackinnon\u2019s power-play goal helped Canada rally to edge Finland 3-2 in a semifinal.<\/p>\n

The center wasn\u2019t the main focus in Milan, but the overall Olympic atmosphere elevated his experience overseas. The bronze is just the cherry on top.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt\u2019s such an awesome experience, just to hang out with all the fans and play for your country,\u201d said Ter\u00e4v\u00e4inen, a 13th-year NHL veteran. \u201cEvery time you step on the ice, you put everything out there and this time, we got at least something back home.\u201d<\/p>\n

It wasn\u2019t the spacious hotels that the Hawks usually get when traveling for road games. The Finnish players stayed in the Olympic Village with small rooms and roommates, where Ter\u00e4v\u00e4inen\u2019s space may have been cramped by his roommate, 6-foot-3, 217-pound Dallas Stars defenseman Esa Lindell.<\/p>\n

Milano Santagiulia Ice Hockey Arena also was being built until the last minute<\/a> for the Olympics. The center noticed the flaws.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe ice was not that good, (it was) soft ice, and that building was really hard to play,\u201d Ter\u00e4v\u00e4inen said. \u201c(But) it was cool, for sure, everything was good.\u201d<\/p>\n

He got some support from his Hawks teammates on top of Finland natives. Nick Foligno had his eyes glued to the screens when Finland competed.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt was awesome to see, and I\u2019m proud, he looked really good,\u201d Foligno said. \u201cIt was fun to watch and cheer him on and (Hawks assistant coach Anders S\u00f6rensen) with Sweden as well.\u201d<\/p>\n

Now, it\u2019s back to business. The bronze medal will be on display at an undisclosed location.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt\u2019s somewhere, not here,\u201d Ter\u00e4v\u00e4inen said with a smile<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"DENVER \u2014 A welcome back was in order for Chicago Blackhawks center Teuvo Ter\u00e4v\u00e4inen, who spent the last…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":477815,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":"","_share_on_mastodon":"0"},"categories":[5115],"tags":[521,37,96,5263,5,55018,4,5851,15233,4445,2787],"class_list":["post-477814","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-chicago-blackhawks","tag-blackhawks","tag-chicago","tag-chicago-blackhawks","tag-chicagoblackhawks","tag-hockey","tag-milan-cortina-winter-olympics","tag-nhl","tag-nick-foligno","tag-team-finland","tag-teuvo-teravainen","tag-winter-olympics"],"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/channels.im\/@nhl\/116150730824894962","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/477814","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=477814"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/477814\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/477815"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=477814"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=477814"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=477814"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}