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Nelli Laitinen (born 29 April 2002) is a Finnish ice hockey player and member of the Finnish national team, currently playing in the Naisten Liiga (NSML) with Kiekko-Espoo. She has committed to play college ice hockey with the Minnesota Golden Gophers women's ice hockey program in the Western Collegiate Hockey Association (WCHA) conference of the NCAA Division I as an incoming freshman for the 2022–23 season.

Playing career
Laitinen began playing ice hockey with the youth department of Lohjan Kisa-Veikot (LoKV) in her hometown of Lohja when she was five years old.

Finland Selects U14

Jan 2019

attended Haukilahti Sports High School, where he attends the Blues U16 practices three times a week. In addition, she also attends evening practice with the Blues U20 once a week.

"In the boys, the game was really physical in the final stages. In women, I have been able to focus more and more on playing the puck. There had to be even more head up. Still practicing with boys is also really developing.

"The women's national team games are quite physical, so playing with the boys has been helpful.

March 2021

did not sign with a SDHL team to remain eligible to play NCAA – March 2021

Jan 2022

Feb 2022

International play
As a junior player with the Finnish national under-18 team, she participated in the IIHF U18 Women's World Championships in 2017, 2018, 2019, and 2020.

Laitinen made her senior national team debut at the 2018 4 Nations Cup in Saskatoon, Canada, where she contributed one assist in four games to Finland’s bronze medal victory. Later that season, she represented Finland at the 2019 IIHF Women's World Championship. At sixteen years old, she was the youngest player on the team and 29 years younger than Finland’s eldest player, Riikka Sallinen. She recorded one assist in seven games as Finland won the first World Championship silver medal in team history.

Laitinen won bronze medals while representing Finland at the 2021 IIHF Women's World Championship and in the women's ice hockey tournament at the 2022 Winter Olympics in Beijing.

Regular season and playoffs
Naisten SM-sarja was rebranded as Naisten Liiga in 2017. Espoo Blues renamed as Kiekko-Espoo in 2019. '' Note: Postseason results for the 2016–17 season are from the qualification series (Karsintasarja) rather than the playoffs and are not calculated with playoff totals. ''

International
Sources: Finnish Ice Hockey Association, Elite Prospects

Honors and achievements
Sources:

Personal life
Laitinen’s older brother, Villi (born 1999), plays ice hockey professionally as a defenseman with Lukko in the Finnish Liiga.

At a pre-Olympic press conference in January 2022, Laitinen confirmed that she was in a relationship with NHL player Jesperi Kotkaniemi.