OSTRAVA, Czech Republic — On January 5th, 2016, Matias Maccelli was in the stands at Hartwall Arena in Helsinki, Finland as the host team beat Russia 4-3 in overtime to win gold at the 2016 IIHF World Junior Championship. On the way home, he told his parents that he wanted to be on that team some day.

Fast forward four years and Maccelli is, in fact, on Finland’s national junior team at the 2020 IIHF World Junior Championship in the Czech Republic, but instead of facing Russia for gold, he’ll have to settle for a match up with Sweden for bronze.

But just being here is a huge accomplishment for the 19-year-old. While he’s participated in international events at the U16, U17 and U18 levels, this is his first IIHF sanctioned event and he wasn’t even on the radar to make this team four months