Penguins Bringing 7th Round Finns to Development Camp, Russian Absent

The Pittsburgh Penguins will bring the pair of seventh-round Finnish draft picks to the Development Camp beginning Saturday afternoon. The diamonds in the rough picks with potential but underdeveloped games were not at the draft in Nashville, but forward Emil Jarventie and large defenseman Kalle Kangas were added to the camp roster Friday.

Jarventie was part of Finland’s U18 team at the World Junior Championship. He had six points (3-3-6) at the WJC tournament. He split most of last season between the Finnish Liiga and a U20 junior team. In Juniors, he had 19 points (8-11-19) in 21 games. In the Finnish Elite League, he had two assists in 15 games.

“I think for him, it’s going to be about rounding out the other parts of his game,” said director of amateur scouting Nick Pryor on Thursday. “But we felt at the point where we got him, it was good to take a chance on a guy that had offensive instincts and an offensive part of his game that we were really attracted to.”

Jareventi is listed at only 5-foot-10, 168 pounds.

Kangas is the opposite type of player. The defenseman is 6-4, 205 pounds, and is hard to play against. He was the next-to-last pick in the 2023 NHL Draft.

“Big defenseman. Extremely hard to play against. Skating is going to need to improve,” said Pryor.

The Penguins will host all but one draft pick, including first-rounder Brayden Yager, third-round Finnish defenseman Emil Pieniniemi, sixth-rounder Cooper Foster, and the pair of seventh-rounders.

The only Penguins draft pick who won’t attend camp is Russian Mikhail Ilyin, selected in the fifth round. However, that’s not a surprise. Pryor admitted the difficulty NHL teams would have getting Russian players over to North America, given the current political climate.

The following players were added Friday.

• Atley Calvert
• Luca Fantilli
• Cooper Foster
• Avery Hayes*
• Emil Jarventie
• Kalle Kangas
• Jay O’Brien
• Emil Pieniniemi
• Jeremy Wilmer
• Brayden Yager