Every NHL team needs a center who is an absolute workhorse to be a competitive, successful team, especially in the Stanley Cup playoffs. While still early, it’s entirely possible the Philadelphia Flyers found theirs in 2024 fourth-round pick Heikki Ruohonen.
Ruohonen, 18, will have two years of learning in the USHL with the Dubuque Fighting Saints before heading to Harvard ahead of the 2026-27 season. After that, Ruohonen will be in his age-21 season, and hopefully, he’ll have learned and developed enough to begin contributing to the Flyers organization at the professional level.
After all, learning is what he does. You probably guessed by looking at the Ivy League school he’s committed to.
“I always saw myself coming to North America. My childhood dream was to play in the NHL,” Ruohonen said at the Flyers’ annual development camp earlier this month. “It’s a smaller rink, and North American style of hockey is a little bit different. I just wanted to get used to it as soon as I could.
“I’ve always been pretty good in school, so I was pretty in between the CHL and going the college route. School’s always been pretty easy for me, so I decided to use that opportunity.”
School is easy, says the guy going to Harvard.
The Flyers knew going into the 2024 NHL Draft that Ruohonen’s smarts transcended the pen and paper in the classroom; hockey IQ was the de facto theme for the organization’s draft class this year. Over the next couple of years, Ruohonen needs only his hands to catch up to his brain to become a menace in the pros.
The young Finn is already quite fast for his size, standing at 6-foot-2, 205 pounds. Ruohonen models his game after Sasha Barkov, the perennial Selke Trophy candidate, dominant two-way center, and captain of the Stanley Cup champion Florida Panthers.
“He’s a Finn and a big body, but moves pretty well,” Ruohonen said.
Another Finn, Anton Lundell, played a starring role in the Panthers’ postseason successes, and getting a center like him is exactly what the Flyers are hoping for with Ruohonen.
Hockey Prospecting data model, created by @ByronMBader
Indeed, Ruohonen–statistically–does not stack up with his two countrymen the way they produced in their respective draft years. But Barkov and Lundell aren’t the only two two-way Finnish centers who went on to have prosperous careers in the NHL.
Former Minnesota Wild captain Mikko Koivu, a 16-year NHL veteran drafted sixth overall in 2001, had very similar draft and pre-draft years. Playing in the U-20 SM-Liiga in his draft year, Koivu posted nine goals, 36 assists, and 45 points in 26 games.
As for Ruohonen? Twenty goals, 27 assists, and 47 points in 37 games.
Two more points in 11 more games isn’t exactly groundbreaking stuff, but you can certainly deduct that Ruohonen is comparatively the better finisher in front of goal at this point in his career. Will that translate to the NHL to help him become a talisman for the Flyers? There’s no guarantee, obviously.
It’s encouraging, though, that the Flyers have managed to snap up a player as smart as Ruohonen, who also has qualities similar to Barkov, Lundell, and Koivu. On the other hand, it means nothing if the Flyers’ development team can’t help him get there.
