2020–21 Liiga season

The 2020–21 SM-liiga season was the 46th season of the SM-liiga, the top level of ice hockey in Finland, since the league's formation in 1975. Due to the COVID-19 pandemic all the games had to be played to a very limited audience or no audience at all.^[1] Two teams have temporarily let go of their coaches due to financial reasons: JYP and SaiPa.^[2] The season was Hakametsä's last full season.

2020–21 SM-liiga
League	SM-liiga
Sport	Ice hockey
Duration	October 2020 – May 2021
Number of teams	15
TV partner(s)	Telia C More
Regular season
Best record	Lukko
Runners-up	HIFK
Season MVP	Robin Press (Lukko)
Top scorer	Petri Kontiola (HPK)
Playoffs
Playoffs MVP	Eetu Koivistoinen (Lukko)
Finals champions	Lukko
Runners-up	TPS

Teams

Jukurit

HIFK

HPK

Ilves
Tappara

JYP

KalPa

KooKoo

Kärpät

Lukko

Pelicans

SaiPa

Ässät

Sport

TPS

Location of teams in 2020–2021 Liiga

Team	City	Head coach	Arena	Capacity	Captain
HIFK	Helsinki	Jarno Pikkarainen	Helsingin jäähalli	8,200	Jere Sallinen
HPK	Hämeenlinna	Matti Tiilikainen	Pohjantähti Areena	5,360	Markus Nenonen
Ilves	Tampere	Jouko Myrrä	Tampereen jäähalli	7,300	Eemeli Suomi
Jukurit	Mikkeli	Marko Kauppinen12.3.2021[3] Jari Kauppila	Ikioma Areena	4,200	Jesper Piitulainen
JYP	Jyväskylä	Mikko Viitanen (27.12.2020–) Jussi Tupamäki (21.10.2020–27.12.2020) Pekka Tirkkonen (furloughed 21.10.2020–31.3.2021)	LähiTapiola Areena	4,437	Jani Tuppurainen
KalPa	Kuopio	Tommi Miettinen	Olvi Areena	5,300	Tommi Jokinen
KooKoo	Kouvola	Jussi Ahokas	Lumon Areena	5,950	Alexander Bonsaksen
Kärpät	Oulu	Mikko Manner	Oulun Energia Areena	6,400	Mika Pyörälä
Lukko	Rauma	Pekka Virta	Kivikylän Areena	4,700	Heikki Liedes
Pelicans	Lahti	Tommi Niemelä	Isku Areena	5,371	Hannes Björninen
SaiPa	Lappeenranta	Ville Hämäläinen (8.11.2020–27.3.2021) Tero Lehterä (furloughed 8.11.2020–27.3.2021)	Lappeenrannan jäähalli	4,820	Jarno Koskiranta
Sport	Vaasa	Risto Dufva	Vaasan Sähkö Areena	4,164	Erik Riska
Tappara	Tampere	Jussi Tapola	Tampereen jäähalli	7,300	Jukka Peltola
TPS	Turku	Raimo Helminen	Gatorade Center	11,820	Lauri Korpikoski
Ässät	Pori	Ari-Pekka Selin	Isomäki Areena	6,350	Niklas Appelgren

Regular season

Top six advanced straight to the quarter-finals, while teams between 7th and 10th positions played a wild card round for the final two spots. The SM-liiga is a closed series and thus there is no relegation. Due to several games having been cancelled due to COVID-19 cases in various teams in March 2021, not all teams got an even number of games, therefore SM-liiga decided that the rankings of the regular season will be determined by points per game average.^[4]

Pos	Team	Pld	W	D	L	GF	GA	GD	W+	Pts	PPG	Final Result
1	Lukko	60	38	7	15	204	114	90	6	127	2.12	Advance to Quarterfinals
2	HIFK	50	26	11	13	153	113	40	7	96	1.92
3	TPS	59	27	18	14	165	140	25	7	106	1.80
4	Tappara	59	26	13	20	171	151	20	8	99	1.68
5	KalPa	58	25	15	18	152	125	27	7	97	1.67
6	Pelicans	58	25	12	21	169	147	22	10	97	1.67
7	Kärpät	58	25	12	21	143	134	9	10	97	1.67	Advance to Wild-card round
8	Ilves	53	25	10	18	161	142	19	3	88	1.66
9	KooKoo	55	25	11	19	165	125	40	5	91	1.65
10	Sport	54	19	12	23	123	140	−17	6	75	1.39
11	HPK	57	16	19	22	143	172	−29	6	73	1.28
12	Ässät	58	15	15	28	150	193	−43	6	66	1.14
13	SaiPa	53	13	9	31	95	147	−52	3	51	0.96
14	Jukurit	57	13	10	34	120	199	−79	5	54	0.95
15	JYP	59	13	12	34	139	211	−72	4	55	0.93

Source: Liiga

Rules for classification: 1) Points per game; 2) 3-point wins 3) Goal difference; 4) Goals scored; 5) Head-to-head points.^[5]

Playoffs

Contrary to the best of three format used in the past seasons, the wild-card round will take place in two games and the aggregate score decides the team which advances.^[6] The remaining rounds will be played in the best-of-5 format instead of the typical best-of-7 format^[7]

Bracket

	Wild-card round (agg-of-2)					Quarter-finals (best-of-5)					Semi-finals (best-of-5)					Finals (best-of-5)
						1	Lukko	3
	8	Ilves	6			8	Ilves	0
	9	KooKoo	4								1	Lukko	3
											4	Tappara	1
						4	Tappara	3			(Pairings are re-seeded after the first and second round)
						5	KalPa	1
																1	Lukko	3
																3	TPS	1
						2	HIFK	3
	7	Kärpät	7			7	Kärpät	0
	10	Sport	3								2	HIFK	1			Bronze medal game
											3	TPS	3
						3	TPS	3								2	HIFK	7
						6	Pelicans	2								4	Tappara	1

Wild-card round

The worse ranked team will play the first game at home. The aggregate score of the two games decides the winner of the round. There will be no over-time or penalty shoot-outs in the first game even if the score is tied. If the aggregate score is tied after the second game, overtime will be played in 20 minute periods until a goal is scored.^[7]

Team 1	Agg.Tooltip Aggregate score	Team 2	1st leg	2nd leg
Sport	3–7	Kärpät	2–4	1–3
KooKoo	4–6	Ilves	1–4	3–2

Quarter-finals

Lukko – Ilves 3-0 19.4.2021 Lukko Ilves 5-3 ref 20.4.2021 Lukko Ilves 4-1 ref 22.4.2021 Ilves Lukko 2-5 ref Lukko wins the series 3-0. TPS – Pelicans 3-2 19.4.2021 TPS Pelicans 3-5 ref 20.4.2021 TPS Pelicans 2-0 ref 22.4.2021 Pelicans TPS 2-3 ref 23.4.2021 Pelicans TPS 5-3 ref 25.4.2021 TPS Pelicans 2-1 ref TPS wins the series 3-2.

HIFK – Kärpät 3-0 19.4.2021 HIFK Kärpät 3-2 ref 20.4.2021 HIFK Kärpät 5-4 OT2 ref 22.4.2021 Kärpät HIFK 2-5 ref HIFK wins the series 3-0. Tappara – KalPa 3-1 19.4.2021 Tappara KalPa 1-0 ref 20.4.2021 Tappara KalPa 3-4 OT2 ref 22.4.2021 KalPa Tappara 1-2 ref 23.4.2021 KalPa Tappara 2-3 ref Tappara wins the series 3-1.

Semi-finals

Lukko – Tappara 3-1 29.4.2021 Lukko Tappara 3-2 OT1 ref 30.4.2021 Lukko Tappara 1-4 ref 2.5.2021 Tappara Lukko 1-4 ref 3.5.2021 Tappara Lukko 0-1 ref Lukko wins the series 3-1.

HIFK – TPS 1-3 29.4.2021 HIFK TPS 4-1 ref 30.4.2021 HIFK TPS 2-3 OT1 ref 2.5.2021 TPS HIFK 3-0 ref 3.5.2021 TPS HIFK 3-2 OT1 ref TPS wins the series 3-1.

Bronze medal game

6 May 2021 18:30

HIFK

7–1 (4–0, 3–0, 0–1)

Tappara

Helsinki Ice Hall, Helsinki

Game reference
	Frans Tuohimaa	Goalies	Christian Heljanko Dominik Hrachovina	Referees: Antti Boman Jani Luoma-aho Linesmen: Niko Jusi Joni Pekkala
	J. Saarinen (D. Bernhardt, J. Jääskä) – 04:37 1–0 J. Sallinen (V. Varakas, V. Leskinen) – 05:48 2–0 M-M Åsten (E. Teräväinen, J. Motin) (PP1) – 14:56 3–0 H. Borgström (V. Leskinen, A. Lundell) (PP1) – 15:44 4–0 J. Sallinen (V. Leskinen, A. Lundell) – 20:32 5–0 T. Tallberg (S. Dyk, A. Broadhurst) – 21:16 6–0 V. Varakas (A. Broadhurst, S. Dyk) – 24:26 7–0 7–1 45:51 – J. Peltola (A. Levtchi, M. Moravčík)
	2 min	Penalties	27 min
	30	Shots	20

Finals

7 May 2021 18:30

Lukko

1–4 (0–1, 1–1, 0–2)

TPS

Kivikylän Areena, Rauma

Game reference
	Lassi Lehtinen	Goalies	Karri Rämö	Referees: Lassi Heikkinen Kristian Vikman Linesmen: Joona Elonen Markus Hägerström
	0–1 11:55 – H. Larsson (R. Ishakov, J. Kestner) (PP1) 0–2 23:16 – T. Haapanen (J. Pärssinen, L. Pajuniemi) R. Press (T. Gregoire, A. Saarela) (PP1) – 33:45 1–2 1–3 52:53 – L. Pajuniemi 1–4 56:24 – L. Pajuniemi (M. Pyyhtiä)
	42 min	Penalties	35 min
	36	Shots	19

8 May 2021 17:00

Lukko

4–0 (0–0, 2–0, 2–0)

TPS

Kivikylän Areena, Rauma

Game reference
	Lassi Lehtinen	Goalies	Andrei Kareyev	Referees: Antti Boman Mikko Kaukokari Linesmen: Onni Hautamäki Jussi Thomann
	E. Koivistoinen (V. Saarijärvi, P. Skalický) – 34:35 1–0 A. Saarela (S. Repo, V. Saarijärvi) – 36:37 2–0 T. Gregoire (H. Liedes) – 51:18 3–0 S. Repo (V. Saarijärvi, E. Koivistoinen) (ENG) – 58:19 4–0
	4 min	Penalties	8 min
	41	Shots	13

10 May 2021 16:00

TPS

1–3 (0–1, 0–0, 1–2)

Lukko

Gatorade Center, Turku

Game reference
	Karri Rämö	Goalies	Lassi Lehtinen	Referees: Antti Boman Mikko Kaukokari Linesmen: Joona Elonen Markus Hägerström
	0–1 17:21 – R. Press (PS) 0–2 58:15 – S. Repo (A. Saarela) (ENG) 0–3 58:46 – P. Skalický (H. Liedes, E. Koivistoinen) (ENG) A. Intonen (T. Haapanen, J. Janatuinen) – 59:51 1–3
	10 min	Penalties	8 min
	22	Shots	29

11 May 2021 16:00

TPS

2–6 (0–2, 2–2, 0–2)

Lukko

Gatorade Center, Turku

Game reference
	Karri Rämö	Goalies	Lassi Lehtinen	Referees: Antti Boman Mikko Kaukokari Linesmen: Joona Elonen Markus Hägerström
	0–1 11:01 – T. Koivisto (E. Koivistoinen, R. Press) 0–2 16:08 – J. Mattila (K. Pospíšil, P. Skalický) J. Kestner (H. Larsson) – 28:12 1–2 A. Anttalainen (J. Pärssinen) – 33:23 2–2 2–3 34:57 – P. Skalický (K. Pospíšil) 2–4 36:29 – E. Koivistoinen (A. Hakulinen, J. Tammela) 2–5 56:05 – H. Liedes (V. Saarijärvi) (SH1, ENG) 2–6 56:33 – E. Koivistoinen (S. Repo, L. Klok) (SH1, ENG)
	8 min	Penalties	4 min
	16	Shots	24

Lukko wins the finals 3-1.

Final rankings

	Lukko
	TPS
	HIFK
4	Tappara
5	KalPa
6	Pelicans
7	Kärpät
8	Ilves
9	KooKoo
10	Sport
11	HPK
12	Ässät
13	SaiPa
14	Jukurit
15	JYP

See also

• 2020–21 Mestis season

References

1. "Liiga jatkuu ensi viikolla - joulukuun ottelut pelataan ilman yleisöä | Uutiset | Liiga" (in Finnish). Liiga.fi. 2020-12-12. Retrieved 2021-01-12.
2. "SaiPa joutui koviin ratkaisuihin - valmennus ja urheilujohto lomautettiin | Yle Urheilu | yle.fi" (in Finnish). Yle.fi. 2020-11-08. Retrieved 2021-01-12.
3. "Jukurit vaihtaa päävalmentajaa | Uutiset | Liiga" (in Finnish). Liiga.fi. 2021-03-12. Retrieved 2021-03-16.
4. "Pistekeskiarvo määrää Liigan runkosarjansijoitukset | Uutiset | Liiga" (in Finnish). Liiga.fi. 2021-03-15. Retrieved 2021-03-16.
5. "Joukkuetilastot | Runkosarja 2020-2021 | Tilastot | Liiga". Liiga.fi. Retrieved 2021-03-24.
6. "Liiga avaa kevään playoffs-ohjelmaa – Ensimmäisellä kierroksella pelataan CHL-formaatilla | Uutiset | Liiga" (in Finnish). Liiga.fi. 2021-04-02. Retrieved 2021-04-02.
7. "Liigan playoffs-ohjelma julkaistu – Näillä askelmerkeillä ratkaisupeleihin | Uutiset | Liiga" (in Finnish). Liiga.fi. 2021-04-12. Retrieved 2021-04-12.

External links

• Official site (in Finnish)