Kari Jurri Biography [2/2]

[hockeyis66 143]

EARLY YEARS

Kari Jurri was born in Groningen, Netherlands as the middle child of three children – one older sister and one younger brother.  His father was a professor at the local university, while his mother was home and raised the kids while doing other things around the house like chores.  Being the middle child and the oldest boy, he was often asked to do the bulk of work around the house, which instilled in him a strong work ethic.  As it goes with middle children sometimes, he often found himself “forgotten” about and having extra time on his hands, which led him into becoming interested in sports.

The Netherlands is known for soccer along with other sports like field hockey and volleyball.  They do have basketball and baseball teams as well, but Jurri fell in love with the speed of the ice at an early age.  He try out speed skating, but during the warm times of the year, Jurri would play soccer and then once he learned about hockey which combined the skills of soccer and skating, he would focus strictly on hockey.

Jurri was not the tallest or shortest kid in his class, but he just had something else that they did not from a young age and that was the burst of speed.  He could just out skate as well as out think other kids to the puck.  His work ethic at a young age of skating, passing, stickhandling and shooting would aid him later in life. Once his chores and school work were complete, Jurri would grab a stick and just skate around with a puck and stick handle around obstacles, pass the puck off of walls on the house and just shoot, shoot, shoot into a make shift net that his father made him from PVC pipes and some netting. 

MIDDLE YOUTH YEARS

Since he grew up on the northern coast of the Netherlands, Jurri was able to play hockey in Germany since the Netherlands did not have an organized structure.  Jurri would often spend the weekends in Germany playing in tournaments but it benefited him greatly since he was able to play against good competition.  After the first couple of tournaments, it was clear that he was much more skilled than players his own age – his skating was smooth and faster, his stick handling was superior, his on ice vision and passing were precise and his shot was just blistering.  Not only could he pick the top corners over the goalie’s glove and blocker, he had so many breakaway moves that would leave the goalies not knowing which way he was going. 

Over his early teen years, Jurri would start to grow a couple of inches per year and one of the big things his German coaches had him do was to hit the weight room cause he was not overly bulky at all.  He could skate and stick handle around defenders but if hit, he would lose the puck and his momentum easily.  He would also train, train and train some more.  He would be doing a lot of skating work as well as taking many shots both wrist and slap.  He was learning to use his big body to shield the puck from defenders as well as changing the angle on his shots to confuse the goalie.

Jurri was going to tournaments now all over Europe – like Sweden, Finland and Norway – to play against kids that were 2 or 3 years older than he was.  Jurri could definitely hold his own against them and was opening the eyes of many scouts across Europe.  Jurri was also a much-disciplined player and did not take many penalties or lose his cool at all.  Although he was very competitive, at the end of the day, he was a leader among his teams and would often be named assistant or team captain due to his calm and easygoing nature.

LATER YOUTH YEARS

With Jurri now in his mid-teens and being 6’2 and about 185 pounds, he was definitely not hard to miss on the ice or off it.  Jurri would now be traveling all over the world to tournaments in Russia, Canada and the United States especially since he had dual citizenship with Germany so that he could play.  His fluid style of play caught the eye of many people and he was playing in 18U tournaments against players older but not necessarily more skilled. 

He was away from home a lot and missed his family, but was getting schooling on the road while still keeping his eye on the bigger prize and that was one day making the VHL.  He was balancing life and hockey pretty well while still being a teen and cherished his time with his family when he got it.  The summers were pretty busy still training even though it was warm out, he was still skating, working out and doing different stick handling and shooting drills.  He would run to work on his stamina, lots of different workouts to strengthen his core, stretching and yoga to keep his muscles loose and some rowing to keep his shoulders and chest strong.

By the time he was 17, Jurri was now 6’3 and about 200 pounds.  As he grew and put muscle on, he did not lose any speed and was like a freight train going up and down the ice.  He had to learn to play smart hockey in that he couldn’t stay on for extended shifts and he couldn’t try to do too much on the ice himself which would cause turnovers, etc.  He was getting a hard look from scouts in the VHL’s minor league system the VHLM. 

Then the call came – “There is an opening in Oslo for about the final 10 games of the season and then you will enter their VHLM draft after the season is over.”  Jurri jumped on the opportunity and was able to play in 11 games, scoring 3 goals and assisting on 2 others for a total of 5 points.  He was also able to get a taste of playoff hockey as Oslo made it to the semi-finals. 

Jurri made the trip to Philadelphia, PA for the VHLM dispersal draft.  He was fully expected to be taken somewhere in the second round, but with last pick of the first round and 8^th overall, Jurri heard his named called by the management team of the expansion Houston Bulls.  The next step of his journey toward the VHL starts here and for the next couple of seasons, its going to be a wild ride in Houston with this goal scoring stud. 

[rjfryman 1,120]

I really enjoyed reading about Kari's development as a skater and player. You were very vivid about his development and how through each stage of his training how and why he was getting better. If I had one thing I would love to have read more about would be about how his family gives him strength or doesn't for that matter. You have a line in there where 'He was away from home and missed his family'. This is great and with the first paragraph talking about his family it sounds like you could have gone either way in how the responsibility to his gave him the drive to push and be more of a leader in the locker room or that since he often found himself 'forgotten' could have been interesting to make it so that he had a chip on his shoulder to prove to his family that they should have paid more attention to him. Not saying that this is a bad bio simply saying if you are going to talk about his family talk about it more or simply remove it. It almost is like you want to give more info but feels that since its a hockey bio it needs more hockey. All in all a really good read that I enjoyed my time with.

[johnnyhockey42 13]

I loved reading about Kari's passion of speed skating and soccer and combining them to play hockey.  It was great reading about his modest beginnings in the sport as well, there was a lot of creativity put into his development and I enjoyed that aspect.  With all of Jurri's travel experience I think he will be able to adjust really well to the toll that games take in the VHL.  I was excited to see Kari get drafted in the first round by Houston, it looks like there was a great deal of thought and care put into the decision to be drafted by them so Kari should be proud! Best of luck in the VHL, thank you for the great read.