TAMPA, FLA. – The lacrosse-style goal that Mikael Granlund scored in the semifinals of the 2011 world championships still lives in infamy in his native Finland.
Not only was the goal that helped lead Finland to a gold medal captured on a postage stamp, Granlund's goal is now one of the most downloaded emojis in Finland. The new hockey emoji app (Lätkäemojit) is available in AppStore and Google Play. The app has been downloaded nearly 50,000 times.
Granlund, the Wild's leading scorer, said he got a look at the emoji version of the ilmaveivi (Finnish for lacrosse-style goal) for the first time Thursday, as did captain Mikko Koivu, who also captained that Finland national team.
"Oh, is that his brother?" Koivu cracked, referring to Vancouver Canucks kid brother Markus Granlund. "Now Granny's head is going to get even bigger. He's going to pick up the phone, call his girlfriend and parents and tell them he's the most downloaded emoji in all of Finland. I'd be honored."
Granlund, rolling his eyes, said sarcastically: "Yeah, that's exactly what I'm going to do. That sounds just like me."
Granlund said he's actually "not a big fan of that goal anyway. I didn't love [the hype] from it. It's just a goal."
Coach Bruce Boudreau thought the emoji looked cool other than the fact it "has more chins than me."
Familiar lines
Boudreau hopes the line juggling stops at some point, but Thursday night, he returned to mostly the lines that played well two games prior against San Jose.