2011–12 SM-liiga season

The 2011–12 SM-liiga season is the 37th season of the SM-liiga, the top level of ice hockey in Finland, since the league's formation in 1975.

Teams

 * Head coaches marked with ‡ took their jobs mid-season.

Regular season
Each team played four times against every other team (twice home and twice away), getting to 52 games. Additionally, the teams were divided to two groups, where teams would play one extra game. One group included Blues, HIFK, Jokerit, JYP, KalPa, Pelicans and SaiPa, while other had HPK, Ilves, Kärpät, Lukko, Tappara, TPS and Ässät.

Additionally, there were two games where teams could choose the opponents. These were played back-to-back in January and the choices were made in December, with team with lowest point total to that date was able to choose first. These pairs were: Ilves-Tappara, SaiPa-HPK, TPS-Lukko, Kärpät-Blues, JYP-HIFK, Jokerit-Pelicans and Ässät-KalPa.

Playoffs
Wild card round (best-of-three) Kärpät-TPS 2-0
 * Kärpät-TPS 4-1
 * TPS-Kärpät 1-2

Blues-Lukko 2-1
 * Blues-Lukko 1-0 (OT)
 * Lukko-Blues 2-0
 * Blues-Lukko 6-3

Quarterfinals (best-of-seven) KalPa-Blues 1-0
 * KalPa-Blues 3-1

Pelicans-Kärpät 1-0
 * Pelicans-Kärpät 5-0

HIFK-Jokerit 0-1
 * HIFK-Jokerit 1-3

JYP-Ässät 1-0
 * JYP-Ässät 4-1