Harvard has announced the hiring of Venla Hovi, who will join the women’s hockey team as an assistant coach.
Hovi, a two-time Olympic medalist with Finland, brings a wealth of coaching and playing experience at both the professional and collegiate levels with her in this new role.
“We are very excited to add Venla to our staff. She brings experience from the highest levels, playing in three Olympic Games and coaching most recently in the professional ranks,” said Harvard head coach Laura Bellamy in a statement. “Venla’s ability to communicate clearly with her players and develop them as individuals will serve us well. The Harvard community is comprised of people from all over the world and we are proud that our coaching staff is a reflection of that. Her familiarity with high performance environments will help us as we strive for a return to national prominence in women’s ice hockey.”
Most recently, Hovi served as the head coach of the Metropolitan Riveters in the PHF during the 2022-23 season. She led the team to 11 wins in her first season at the helm, the most for the group since the 2017-18 season.
A noted trailblazer in the professional hockey space, Hovi famously became the first woman to join the NHL’s Winnipeg Jets in a coaching capacity after she was hired as a development coach by the organization before the 2019-20 season. In her first full-time coaching role, she worked with players from the youth level all the way up to the Jets and its AHL affiliate, the Manitoba Moose, on skill development and technique.
In addition to her role with the Jets, Hovi took on an assistant coach role at the University of Manitoba in 2018-19. She helped lead the Bisons to a third-place finish in the USports women’s hockey championship in 2018-19, while securing a combined 34 wins in her two seasons on staff in 2018-19 and 2019-20.
Hovi’s first head coaching role began in 2020, when she took over as the leader of the Okanagan Hockey Academy U17 program. She served in this role for two seasons before departing for the PHF.
One of the most decorated players in Finnish women’s ice hockey history, Hovi was a three-time Olympian for Finland. Led by Hovi, Finland secured two bronze medals in the 2010 and 2018 Olympic Games in Vancouver and Pyeongchang, respectively. Hovi skated in over 200 international competitions with Finland before her retirement from the game in 2019.
Her illustrious 15-year playing career stretched from 2004 to 2019 and featured stops with multiple Finnish professional clubs before a stint at Manitoba from 2015 to 2018. During the 2017-18 season with the Bisons, Hovi helped lead the team to the USports championship, securing the Golden Path Trophy for the first time in program history. The forward was named the 2017-18 Bison Sports Female Athlete of the Year for her efforts in the championship run.
Her success did not stop there, as she took her talents to the Canadian professional ranks in 2018-19. In just one season with the Calgary Inferno of the CWHL, Hovi helped the group win its second Clarkson Cup in franchise history. Hovi also became the first player from Finland to win the trophy.
Hovi holds a bachelor’s degree in communications and applied linguistics from the University of Vaasa and a post-graduate degree in English as a second language (ESL) from Manitoba.
