Former Vancouver Canucks First-Round Pick Announces Life-Changing News

It's been quite an eventful summer thus far for the Vancouver Canucks in terms of what the club as done to build their roster for the 2025-26 season, as well as some big news away from hockey regarding players in the organization.

Earlier this month, forward Filip Chytil, who is back to 100 percent health and already preparing for next season, got married in his home nation of Czechia to his longtime girlfriend, Nikol Hlavackovn.

Chytil wasn't the only player with ties to the Vancouver Canucks organization to get married this summer as one of their former first-round picks also tied the knot recently.

In a post on Instagram last week, Emma Niemi, the longtime girlfriend of former Vancouver Canucks first-round pick Olli Juolevi, shared a video confirming that the two got married in Helsinki, Finland this summer, surrounded by several of their family and friends.

The Helsinki native was selected fifth overall by the Vancouver Canucks back in 2016 and after a successful junior career with the OHL's London Knights, along with a strong one-year loan in Finland with TPS, there was plenty of hope that he would become a top pairing defenseman for the club.

However, that didn't happen, as Juolevi appeared in just 23 games for the Canucks during the 2020-21 season, tallying three points (two goals, one assist), before he was traded to the Florida Panthers in October 2021 in exchange for Juho Lammikko and Noah Juulsen.

Two years ago, Juolevi made the decision to head overseas to Europe to join Timra IK in the Swedish Hockey League and a month later, signed in his home nation of Finland with Tappara Tampere, likely signalling the end of his career in the National Hockey League.

After appearing 40 regular season games and 16 playoff contests with Tappara during the 2023-24 campaign, the club signed him to a one-year extension, but unfortunately for both them and Juolevi, he missed the majority of this past year due to injury.

The 27-year-old blueliner was limited to just nine games during the regular season and also featured in another nine during the playoffs and shortly after Tappara's elimination, they announced that Juolevi would not be returning to them for the 2025-26 campaign.

The offseason for teams in Europe is slowly winding down and some leagues, such as Liiga in Finland, are even beginning their preseason games in less than a week, but Juolevi remains an unrestricted free agent and as things stand right now, it's unclear where he'll be suiting up next in his career.