The length of the North American pro hockey season, combined with the ongoing intensity of games, is almost always the biggest takeaway for first-year players.

The way you’re already falling behind in your efforts to recover right off the bat — there just aren’t enough calories to be eaten given the demands of games every 2.5 days — the way everything is sore by Christmas if you manage to stay healthy enough to play every night, the way mistakes only get amplified by your fatigue, it all adds up.

“It felt like two Swedish seasons really,” Jonathan Lekkerimaki said Wednesday after a skate with some of his Canucks teammates, looking back at 2024-25, his first season in North America.

[ Jonathan Lekkerimaki on May 31, 2025, at Abbotsford.] Jonathan Lekkerimaki on May 31, 2025, at Abbotsfor

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