Ville Peltonen - Playing Career

Playing Career

Peltonen started playing hockey with Etelä-Vantaan Urheilijat (EVU), and moved to HIFK when he was ten years old. He debuted the Finnish SM-liiga in 1991–92 SM-liiga season, playing six games in regular season. The following year, Peltonen scored 13 goals and 37 points in 46 games with HIFK winning the Jarmo Wasama memorial trophy as the best rookie of the season. The NHL franchise San Jose Sharks drafted Peltonen as their third round pick, 58th overall in the 1993 NHL Entry Draft. Peltonen decided to stay with HIFK for two more seasons before heading to the NHL.

In his rookie season in the NHL, Peltonen played 31 games with Sharks, scoring 13 points. He scored his first career NHL goal on February 26, 1996 against the Montreal Canadiens into an empty net in a Sharks 7-4 victory, San Jose's first ever over Montreal. He also played 29 regular season games for Sharks' IHL affiliate Kansas City Blades, scoring 18 points. However, San Jose did not make the playoffs. The next season Peltonen scored only five points in 28 NHL games, but with the Kentucky Thoroughblades he scored 22 goals and 52 points in 40 games. After two years in the NHL, Peltonen returned to Europe to play for Västra Frölunda HC of Swedish Elitserien. He was the best pointman of the league, scoring 51 points in 49 games. After a successful season with Frölunda, Peltonen returned to NHL to play for Nashville Predators. However, his returning season was short lived, when he injured after 14 games. Before the injury, Peltonen had scored 10 points with the team. He stayed with the Predators for two more seasons, but in 2000-2001 NHL season he played mostly for Milwaukee Admirals, and was chosen to AHL's All Star Game.

After the years in Nashville, Peltonen returned to SM-liiga, signing a two-year contract with Jokerit, a local competitor of Peltonen's former SM-liiga team HIFK. He was chosen as the captain of the team, but was injured and played only 30 games of the regular season scoring 29 points. However, Jokerit and Peltonen won the Kanada-malja championship. He continued with Jokerit in 2002–03 SM-liiga season, scoring 42 points in 49 games. He won the Raimo Kilpiö trophy as league's "gentleman player", and was chosen to the league's All-Star lineup.

After a two-season stint with Jokerit, Peltonen headed to Switzerland's National League A to play for HC Lugano, where he played three outstanding seasons. In his first season with the team, he scored career-high 28 goals, 44 assists and 72 points in only 48 games, winning the title of league's best pointman. The following season Peltonen scored 56 points. In his last season with the team, he was named the captain of the team. Peltonen led the playoffs in goal scoring, and also scored the game-winning goal winning the championship of the league. The great three seasons with Lugano gave Peltonen an opportunity to return to NHL, this time for Florida Panthers. In his first season with Florida, he scored 37 points in 72 games of regular season. The following season was disturbed by a leg injury, which caused Peltonen to miss 24 games. Peltonen stayed with the Panthers for one more season, but then moved to Kontinental Hockey League to play for HC Dinamo Minsk, where he was once again the captain of his team. However, Peltonen only scored 26 points in 51 games for the team in regular season.

After only one season in KHL Peltonen returned for his old franchise HIFK with a two-year contract in 2010, and was named as team's captain. Peltonen scored 28 goals and 65 points, and finished second in points of the whole league after Perttu Lindgren of Lukko, who scored 66 points. Peltonen was chosen as the best player of the regular season winning the Lasse Oksanen trophy. He was also awarded with the Raimo Kilpiö trophy for second time during his career, and for the first time he also won the Kultainen kypärä (The Golden Helmet), being awarded as the best player by league's other players. Peltonen was chosen to the All-Star lineup and HIFK won the Kanada-malja championship for first time since 1998 as Peltonen, Mikael Granlund and Juha-Pekka Haataja led the team to the championship.

In the 2011-12 SM-liiga season, Peltonen played 49 regular season games scoring 24 goals and 48 points, finishing as the ninth player of the league in points. After another great season, 38-year old forward decided to continue his career with the IFK.