Panthers C Olli Jokinen Named NHL's Offensive Player of the Week

SUNRISE, FL – The National Hockey League announced today that C Olli Jokinen has been named the league's offensive player of the week for the period ending on Sunday, Mar 12.

Jokinen, 27, leads the Panthers and is tied for 12th in the NHL scoring race with a career best 71 points (32-39-71). In four games last week, he recorded five goals and four assists with a +9 rating, including the game-winner in Florida's 5-3 win over Carolina on Friday, Mar. 10. Jokinen helped guide the Cats to a 3-0-1 mark last week, with wins over Northeast Division leading Ottawa Senators and a pair of wins versus the Southeast Division leading Carolina Hurricanes.

The Kuopio, Finland native ranks among the franchise leaders with 239 points (6th), 109 goals (3rd), 129 assists (6th), 21 game-winning goals (3rd), and 37 power-play goals (3rd). This season he joined Pavel Bure as only the second player in franchise history to record three consecutive 20-goal seasons.

For his career in the National Hockey League, Jokinen has played in 541 contests for three different teams (Florida, New York Islanders & Los Angeles) recording 129 goals, 152 assists and 281 points. Jokinen has posted more than 50 points three times in his eight-year playing career, including two seasons of 60-plus points (2002-03 & 2005-06). He was originally acquired from the NY Islanders along with Roberto Luongo on June 24, 2000 in exchange for Mark Parrish and Oleg Kvasha.

Most recently, he starred on the Finnish Olympic squad earning a silver medal at the 2006 Torino Winter Games, posting eight points (6-2-8) and a +5 rating. Named to the Eastern Conference All-Star team in the 2002-03 season, Jokinen scored a goal and added three assists.

Florida forward Jozef Stumpel, who posted nine points (4-5-9 in four games), Detroit Red Wings forward Pavel Datsyuk (4-4-8 in four games) and Pittsburgh Penguins forward Sidney Crosby (3-5-8 in four games) were runners-up for offensive honors.