OHL Alumni Central

Robert with Kiekko-Vantaa of Finland's Mestis.

The Ontario Hockey League European import list is typically dominated by Russians and Czechs. Robert Nyholm was one of the few that came to the OHL from Finland.

Nyholm played two seasons in the Ontario Hockey League, 2006-07 and 2007-08, both with the Kingston Frontenacs. In his rookie season he contributed 34 points in 66 games and in his second just 5 in 27 with Kingston.

Robert came to the OHL already a draft pick of the NHL’s Columbus Blue Jackets. He was taken in the fifth round of the 2006 draft, 129th overall. He has yet to play a game of professional hockey in North America, choosing to return to his home Finland immediately after leaving the OHL.

Nyholm twice represented Finland at the IIHF under-18 tournament, 2005 and 2006. In 2006, Finland took the silver medal with Robert putting in two goals and an assist in five games.

Nyholm has gone through the ranks of the Finnish hockey club HIFK. He played for the HIFK junior team before leaving for Kingston and is now entering his third season playing for the elite club in Finland’s SM-Liiga. He has also spent time with their affiliate in the Mestis (tier 2), Kiekko-Vantaa, each season.

Check out Robert Nyholm’s profile page at the HIFK official website.

Check out Robert Nyholm’s profile page at the SM-Liiga official website. With a little translation, this is one of the most indepth sites for player stats.

Robert Nyholm, and all other OHL Alumni still active in pro hockey, can be found on the OHL Alumni Central Big List.

Dale McTavish with Zug in Switzerland.

Dale McTavish played four seasons in the Ontario Hockey League from 1989-90 to 1992-93, all with the Peterborough Petes. A consistent offensive producer right from the start, Dale scored 103 regular season goals and 246 regular season points for the Petes over the four years.

In his final season with Peterborough, the Petes won the Hamilton Spectator as the league’s regular season champion and won the Robertson Cup with a 4-1 victory over the Sault Ste. Marie Greyhounds. Dale contributed 17 points in 21 playoff games for the team.

McTavish went undrafted by an NHL team and chose to play in the Canadian university system after graduating from the Ontario Hockey League. In two seasons with St. Francis Xavier, Dale led the team in scoring each year.

During the 1995-96 season, McTavish played for the Canadian National Team. he was the team’s points leader with 56 in 53 games. He would later return to play for Team Canada during the 1999-00 season, appearing in four games.

McTavish caught the attention of the Calgary Flames and played nine games with the club during the 1996-97 season. He also appeared in 53 games with the Saint John Flames of the American Hockey League that year.

Since the start of the 1997-98 season, Dale has played in Europe. His first three seasons were spent in Finland’s SM-Liiga, two with SaiPa and one with the Espoo Blues. Each of those three seasons, McTavish led his team in total points. In his first season in Finland, he led the league in goals scored with 25 in 47 games.

2000-01 saw the start of a 10 year stretch in Switzerland’s National League A. Three times he was his team’s leading point getter and was a member of the All-Star team for the 2007-08 season. In all, he played 361 games in the NL-A, scoring 188 goals and adding 190 assists for 378 points.

This season sees Dale return to SaiPa of Finland’s SM-Liiga, eleven years after last playing for the club. He is joined by fellow Ontario Hockey League and Peterborough Petes grad, Scott Barney.

Check out Dale McTavish’s profile page on the SaiPa official website.

Michal Birner played two seasons in the Ontario Hockey League, 2004-05 and 2005-06. His first season in the OHL was split between the Barrie Colts and the Saginaw Spirit. His final season in the Ontario Hockey League was played exclusively with Saginaw. While with Saginaw, he set the team’s mark for the fastest three goals scored.

Over the 2005-06 season, Birner was second on Saginaw Spirit scoring during the regular season, three points behind team leader Ryan McDonough. However, Michal played eight less games during the season. The missed games were in part due to Birner representing his native Czech Republic at the IIHF World Junior Hockey Championships (under-20) that were played in Canada. The Czechs left the tournament without a medal.

Birner also represented the Czech Republic on the international stage earlier on in his hockey career when he was on the roster for the 2004 IIHF World Under-18 Championships. Michal contributed five points in seven games as the Czech’s won bronze with a win over Canada in Belarus.

Birner was drafted by the St. Louis Blues in the fourth round of the 2004 NHL draft, 116th overall. He spent his first full season after graduating from the Ontario Hockey League with the Blues’ AHL farm team, the Peoria Rivermen. The following season, he started with Peoria and ended with the Portland Pirates. In 2008-09, he played two games with the AHL’s Iowa Chops before being demoted to the ECHL. Birner chose not to report and instead signed with Pelicans of Finland’s SM-Liiga.

Michal’s season with Pelicans lasted only six games and he was sidelined for the rest of the season with a broken hand. This past season, he remained in the SM-Liiga but with TPS, a storied team that has been around since 1929 (as a sports club, TPS has been around since 1922). His 45 regular season points with TPS was good enough for third on the team in scoring, only four points from the leader. More importantly, TPS won the league championship.

Birner is signed on with TPS for the upcoming 2010-11 season.

Check out Michal Birner’s profile page on the TPS official website.

Check out this recent post on Michal’s teammate with the Spirit, Patrick Asselin.

Lou Dickenson with Vaasan Sport in Finland.

Never known as a scorer in the Ontario Hockey League, Lou Dickenson poured it on last season in Finland’s Mestis League, a level below the elite SM-Liiga. Lou was the league’s leading point-getter, playing for Vaasan Sport. His 26 goals and 35 assists for 61 points over 44 games was good enough for the league lead. The season before, with KooKoo, Lou lead the league in goals with 28 in 43 games.

Dickenson played five seasons in the Ontario Hockey League. He also appeared on five different team rosters over his OHL career. He began in the OHL in 1998-99 with the Mississauga IceDogs and played his first two full seasons at the Hershey Centre. In 2000-01, he started the season with the London Knights and midway through the season ended up with the Kingston Fontenacs. 2001-02 was split between the Frontenacs and the Guelph Storm and his final season was split between the Storm and the Ottawa 67′s, a team that lost out in the Robertson Cup finals that year.

Lou was drafted in the 4th round of the 2000 NHL draft by the Edmonton Oilers, 113th overall. He spent one season, 2003-04, in the Canadian university system with St. Thomas in New Brunswick. He followed that by a season in the North American pro hockey scene with three different teams: San Antonio Rampage (AHL), Texas Wildcatters (ECHL) and Laredo Bucks (CHL).

2005-06 was Dickenson’s introduction to the world of European hockey. He played in the Italian Serie B and scored 43 goals and 79 points in just 41 games. The following year, he literally toured Europe playing on two Swedish teams, the Edinburgh Capitals of Great Britain’s EIHL and Ljubljana in Slovenia.

Lou returned to North America for the 2007-08 season but found his way back to Europe for the following campaign. Lou has been in Finland since.

The 2010-11 season has Lou stepping up to the SM-Liiga and playing for the Pelicans. The Pelicans play out of Lahti, Finland, a city with just over 100,000 people and the eighth largest city in Finland. Lahti is just 100km out of Helsinki.

Check out Lou Dickenson’s profile page on the Pelicans official website.

Kamil Kreps is saying goodbye to sunny Florida and hello to Oulu, Finland. The Brampton Battalion alumnus was not given an offer to stay on board with the Florida Panthers of the NHL so he has signed on with Oulun Karpat.

Kreps played three seasons in the Ontario Hockey League from 2001-02 to 2003-04, all with Brampton. Kamil was a second round pick of the Panthers in the 2003 NHL draft, 38th overall. He spent 14 games with the Panthers in 2006-07 and has been a regular with the team for the past three seasons. Unfortunately, he wasn’t developing in the manner the Panthers had hoped. One report stated that Kamil just didn’t have the strength to compete physically with NHL calibre players. However, himself and his new team believe that he is a perfect fit for the European game.

Karpat finished 9th in the 14 team SM-Liiga over the 58 game regular season schedule this past season. Oulu is a city of around 140,000 people located on the west coast of Finland.  The team plays out of the Oulun Energia Areena which fits 6,614 for hockey.

Kamil has yet to be profiled on the Oulu Karpat official website but you can visit it here.

For the time being, Kamil Krep’s profile page at the Florida Panthers official website is still available.

Check out these previous posts on OHL alumni playing in Finland:

Gabriel Spilar of the Finland Blues.

Scott Barney of Saipa in Finland.

Kamil Kreps is also featured in this previous post listing Brampton Battalion alumni playing pro hockey.