Photo by Terry Wilson / OHL Images.
Player Information
Team: Kitchener Rangers
Nationality: Finnish
Position: Defense
Handedness: Right
Date of Birth: August 12, 2002
Height and Weight: 6’4″ / 201 lbs
Introduction
The former Finnish under-18 star had a blazing start in Kitchener amassing 10 points (four goals and six assists) in his first 15 games. Despite an impressive early showing, he was lost in the shuffle with Kitchener opting for experience over youth on the back-end. The Rangers trading for experienced Soo Greyhounds defender Holden Wale mid-season was the nail in his production casket, seeing Ottavainen relegated to the third pairing. Seven to eleven minutes a night just was not enough for him to find any rhythm.
The 35th overall 2019 CHL import draft selection has a deal in place with Kärpät for 2020/21 but he still has a desire to play in the OHL. With Covid-19 screwing up alot of league start dates, we will likely see him hit Canadian shores later than sooner, perhaps choosing to opt out of his Kärpät deal once OHL action resumes.
Player Assessment
In each of my player assessments, you will find four categories that I evaluate each prospect on:
- Mind – The way a player processes and sees the game.
- Movement – The way in which a player drives play and manuvres around the ice.
- Mechanics – Hands and skating aspects.
- Motor – How they apply themselves shift to shift, what “compete levels” they show.
I’ll go through each category, explaining the key strengths and weakness for each individual prospect.
Mind
Ottavainen is simple. How is that for an opening statement huh? He’s not simple in the derogatory way though, more so he just plays a certain way where nothing is ever complicated or overly systematic; locate the puck, break the play up, retrieve the puck and skate with it. That is all. Nothing outlandish and when you think about, is that not the basics of simple defense? Ottavainen may not do any of this with as much regularity or flair as many defensive prospects rated ahead of him, but when called upon to do so he shows more often than not, simplicity can be the best base for a defenseman.
Being as big and as mobile as he is, often Ville makes these simple plays look spectacular. He is your modern day push-the-pace from the back-end blueliner, who loves to be a catalyst from within his own-end. At times you can’t help but sit back and appreciate the way his cognitive responses align with the physical ability. Here are just a few clips of Ottavainen’s bread and butter.
As you can see there is a positive simplicity to the way he thinks, he’s always looking to advance the puck and generate offense. Ottavainen has the all the physical tools you’d want in a modern day defenseman and for the most part, displays a simple yet effective mindset to boot.
But there are hiccups, the little blips that make you shake your head and ask yourself “What did you see there bud?”. I wouldn’t say they are massively egregious errors, it’s more so a case of when a young player’s mind runs out of tarmac. In the clips below, the strength of Ottavainen’s game is evident. The puck control and spacial recognition in transition is great but at times, the vision and awareness of what may just be the most advantageous play for his team comes across a tad deadpan. I’ve also extended the clip so you can see the end results.
Both turnovers were avoidable. Simple little errors that nearly ended up costing a goal the other way. The frustrating thing with Ottavainen isn’t the skills, it’s the lack of nous when his preferable options aren’t available. Just holding the puck a bit longer or just a turn of the head to survey before distributing would see him create more positive plays.
Movement
As stated above, Ottavainen is a weapon in transition but I do feel much more at ease however when he’s skating it down a defenseman’s throat rather then setting up play by way of pass. He may not possess your typical offensive defenseman’s north/south speed but his strength, mobility and spacial recognition allows him to power through the neutral zone and get good scoring opportunities.
In terms of positioning, Ottavainen is pretty stout. He has displays good gap control in his own end when joining the rush does so when the opportunity arises, he doesn’t pinch or push into spaces unnecessarily. Ottavainen won’t kill you by way of mental mistakes with his positioning or efforts over 200-feet.
Mechanics
When discussing Ottavainen, I can’t help but feel that if he were to fix some things mechanically we’d so a much better product.
First off, his shot. Ottavainen more so relies on his size and leverage to generate power in his shot. He leans over the puck and more so pushes or whips the puck rather than extends his hands, thus losing torque in his shot wind-up. His shot doesn’t get him into trouble as such, but he does get alot of opportunities where that little bit of extra pop in his shot perhaps would result in a better outcome. Ottavainen also lacks some creative touch when finishing in close. He doesn’t really posses the ability to transition forehand to backhand in order to deceive a defense or goaltender, he tends to just push the puck toward the net without having that killer instinct to roof it bar down from in close.
His hands however are much better when not shooting. Ottavainen does display some sneaky good puck skills, it’s just not often enough. I’ve seen on occasion that he can have the puck on a string and totally bamboozle defenders with skill. I’m not sure if it’s a confidence thing but he should be encouraged to do more.
A BIG skating adjustment is what I think will see Ville really free up his game and see him be more dominant. Mechanically he’s actually pretty sound, there isn’t a great deal wrong. But where I see a potential improvement is he needs to be able to curl and pivot in a much tighter radius aswell as finding some initial separation speed. Ottavainen will somewhat lumber into a scoring area relying on almost size alone to get him there. Adding a deceptive bow to his skating, allowing him to utilise his size better would be very beneficial. He shields the puck well and as you can see has a strong skating base to go with it, but too often he gets straight line fever. I want to see him garner the ability to chance his pace and angles (especially on entry) and carve his way into better areas. Stop and prop, freeze a defender out. Driving deep and often won’t cut it at the next level.
As you can see in this clip he is still able to get by his guy, he just lacks that bit of extra pop both laterally and on the first step to gain the separation needed to find space quicker.
Ottavainen could be that much better by adding that extra dynamic to his skating.
Motor
In terms of motor, Ottavainen is a very reserved player who will pick and choose when to go full throttle but he in no way is what I’d call lazy. His positioning is always on point so he doesn’t really have to burn unnecessary fuel.
Conclusion
Ottavainen may just be one of the many high-upside, potential picks of the later rounds. He has so many good traits already, there just needs to be some more natural maturation in his skills to occur. If a GM can be patient with him I see him as great value outside of 100 picks.
Ville Ottavainen is my 136th ranked player for the 2020 NHL Draft.
You can find a bunch of Ville’s advanced stats and 149 more ranked prospect’s stats and evaluations on my twitter: @AshGloverHockey