4th year Latvian-born defenseman Janis Jaks(72) signs on for a 2nd season to stay with HC Litvinov of Czechia Extraliga for 2023/2024.
The 6’1″ 190 lbs. blue liner played a lot of his youth hockey and beginnings of juniors before coming over to the NAHL with Minnesota Wilderness, where he was twice a +10 player fully grounded in his own zone and helped his team with the 2015 Robertson Cup.
After spending 4 fairly strong sessions at American International College Yellowjackets, he signed with Dinamo Riga, but after 17 KHL games, the relationship soured and he agreed next to Bakersfield Condors and things were looking decent with 2 goals and 4 assists in 20 AHL games with a +3 rating.
He would return to Russia to skate for HK Sochi, but the results didn’t yield much, so he turned his attention to where he is now with much better results, 8 goals, 17 assists in 47 games with a +3 rating to move forward.
The 27-year old has to have at least a little smile on his face to how things are going, especially after winning Bronze at the recent IIHF Worlds.
After 2 strong seasons with the same team, he was in a pretty good spot for himself, but decides to sign with rivals, HC Energie Karlovy Vary.