With the 104th pick of the 2010 NHL Draft, the St. Louis Blues selected Jani Hakanpaa, a defenseman from Finland. You'll quickly remember, Blues director of amateur scouting Jarmo Kekalainen is from Finland (Note: As is chief Euro scout Ville Siren - GTPD) and will be returning home to be a club GM after this draft is complete. So there's obviously some familiarity there.
After the trade of David Rundblad Friday night, the Blues were obviously in need of a European defenseman.
In a Finnish junior league last season, the 6-foot 4-inch Hakanpaa tallied two goals, 12 assists and 49 penalty minutes in 23 games. So he's got some size and possibly some toughness and just turned 18 at the end of March.He won a bronze medal for the Finnish team at the World Juniors. He tallied one goal and one assist in the tournament.
Not a lot of information on this guy so far. We're still looking. We'll update this post.
Update from Game Time Prospect Department:
LINK to Hakanpaa's profile at EliteProspects.com. Not a lot of info available yet; still looking. Apparently he played pretty well for the bronze medal winning Finns in the 2010 U18's, and was named one of their Top Three players in the tournament. His rights in Finland belong to Blues Espoo (how appropriate is that?), and he'll play for the Blues' A-nuorten SM-Liiga junior club next year.