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'Minny Boy' Oliver Bjorkstrand becomes leading man in the WHL

Oliver Bjorkstrand #27 of the Portland Winterhawks. (Photo by Marissa Baecker/Getty Images)
Oliver Bjorkstrand #27 of the Portland Winterhawks. (Photo by Marissa Baecker/Getty Images)

Oliver Bjorkstrand’s home in Herning, Demark is a long way from Minnesota. Despite that fact, the Portland Winterhawks star has found himself in an elite group among his teammates. There are four players on the Western Hockey League club who call the state of Minnesota home.

Somehow, Bjorkstrand has managed to join the group as an honourary Minny Boy.

“We let him in the group,” said teammate Paul Bittner, who hails from the small-town of Crookston, Minn. “He’s our fifth member for sure; he calls himself a Minny Boy.”

There are other ties to be sure. Bjorkstrand’s father, Todd, is a former pro player who left home in Minneapolis to play in the top Danish league with Herning before retiring and becoming a hockey coach.

Bjorkstrand says his favourite team growing up was the Minnesota Wild, because he really liked watching Marian Gaborik. A childhood in Denmark, however, meant his NHL viewings were limited to what he could find on YouTube and on the league’s website.

Now, as the WHL’s top scorer, Bjorkstrand is hoping to appeal to a new generation of hockey fans in Denmark. He and his countrymen have become popular back in his home nation after leading the Danes to their first quarter-final berth at the world junior championship. It was that tournament that seemed to be the catalyst for Bjorkstrand to construct a brilliant second half of the season.

“I had a good second half of the year,” understated Bjorkstrand, a third-round pick of the Columbus Blue Jackets in 2013. “I really took off, because I feel like I had a slow start. I came back from Columbus training camp and I guess it was a slow start for me and the team – we lost a lot of games and nobody really got going.”

“For me the turning point was really after I played at the world juniors at Christmas time. That’s when I really stepped my game up and started feeling a lot of confidence and the team started to get a lot of confidence, too. That’s where it all started for me.”

After returning from the world juniors, Bjorkstrand started averaging more than two points per game and finished the back half of the regular season with 39 goals and 78 points in 36 games. The right-winger won the WHL’s scoring title with 63 goals and 118 points in 59 games. Even his teammates noticed a difference in Bjorkstrand once he returned from the under-20 championship, where he helped the Danes earn their first win in the top tier – a huge accomplishment for the small nation with 25 rinks.

“He just had this internal drive,” said Bittner, who has played most of the season on a line with Bjorkstrand and centre Nic Petan. “It really set him apart from the great players to being Oliver Bjorkstrand in the league. He came back with drive and a lot of pride and it showed in his game.

“There was a big wow factor when he came back because you could tell he just wanted it.”

Coming into the season, Bjorkstrand says he was just hoping to hit another 50-goal season. Once he had that goal achieved, he moved on to the WHL scoring title. Now he’s hoping for another WHL title with the Winterhawks, who have made it to the Western Conference final for four straight seasons. They’ve never trailed a playoff series by more than two games and they’ve been to the WHL final fou

Columbus Blue Jackets' Oliver Bjorkstrand. (AP Photo/Paul Vernon)
Columbus Blue Jackets' Oliver Bjorkstrand. (AP Photo/Paul Vernon)

r straight times and won the league championship once in that span.

“The expectations from the fans are really high right now,” said Bjorkstrand. “They expect us to be in the finals because they’ve been used to it for the past four years. They’ve been spoiled a little bit, but that’s just how it is in Portland – they expect us to win and we want to win.”

Currently, the Everett Silvertips are all that’s standing between Portland and a fifth consecutive Western Conference final appearance. The Winterhawks lead the series 2-1 heading into Friday night’s Game 4 and the Silvertips did a good job in the first two games containing Bjorkstrand, physically punishing him and trying to frustrate him.

“Some of their bigger guys are trying to finish their checks on me and maybe trying to get me off my game,” said the six-foot, 168-pound forward. “I’m aware of that and if somebody goes after me, I try to stay positive and not get to frustrated if anything happens to me. I have to think about my game and what I have to do help the team win.”

As Everett found out in Game 3, you can’t stop Oliver Bjorkstrand, you can only hope to slow him down. The 20-year-old scored two goals to help the Winterhawks to a 5-3 victory on Thursday night.

“Everybody’s eyeing on Oliver,” said Bittner, a top prospect for the 2015 NHL draft. “With 63 goals this season everyone is going to take notice of a special player like he is and Nic (Petan) and I have been trying to give him as much support as we can, like saying, ‘Hey, you’re doing fine man, you’re working hard and good things will come.’ Everett’s a good defensive team and they do a good job in their own end.

“But Oliver never gets down on himself so he never thinks of himself as out of the fight.”