During his ironman, consecutive-game streak, Avalanche defenseman Karlis Skrastins has played a lot of games in Canada.
Whenever he’s there, he makes a point of visiting a specific establishment.
“Every time I’m in Canada, I drink Tim Hortons coffee and have some doughnuts,” Skrastins said last week.
He smiled.
“Those are good things,” he added.
It’s not hard to find a Tim Hortons – grammarians might grimace, but there is no apostrophe in the restaurant’s name – in Canada. There are about 2,700 of them north of the border, and over 300 in 11 U.S. states. Most are franchises. The coffee – real coffee, none of that latte silliness – is legendary, and you don’t even have to use some idiotic term for the sizes. Think of Krispy Kreme, Starbucks and a sandwich shop all tossed into a blender, and you’ve got the idea. (The apple fritters are the best on the planet, and the doughnut holes – or Timbits – also are best-sellers.)
Did Skrastins know about Horton as a player, not just the founder of the doughnut shop?
“Yeah, I do,” Skrastins said. “And now I’m getting to know more and more.”
Knock on wood, Skrastins will tie Horton’s ironman record for defensemen Tuesday, when he plays his 486th consecutive game against Florida; and will pass Horton against Atlanta on Thursday.
Myles Gilbert “Tim” Horton was a mean- streak defenseman who played most of his 1950-74 career with Toronto before moving on to the Rangers, Pittsburgh and Buffalo. He was playing for the Sabres and commuting to and from Toronto when he was killed in a one-car accident near St. Catherines, Ontario, on Feb. 21, 1974. He was returning to Toronto after a game in Buffalo and, going an estimated 100 mph, he lost control of his Pantera sports car. He wasn’t wearing a seat belt and was killed when thrown from the car. He was 44.
Horton began his doughnut dynasty in 1964, opening “Tim Horton” in Hamilton, Ontario. He and former Hamilton police officer Ron Joyce became full partners in 1967 and expansion was underway when Horton was killed. Joyce bought out the Horton family for $1 million. Horton’s widow, Lori, failed in a legal battle to have the deal overturned, saying the family should have been paid more. Tim Hortons merged with Wendy’s in 1995, with Joyce having more stake in the combined company than even Wendy’s founder Dave Thomas. Last year, Wendy’s spun off Hortons into a separate, publicly traded company.
Canadian author Douglas Hunter’s 1994 book about Horton, “Open Ice,” is one of the better sports biographies ever published.
“Keaner” still taking the ice
Former Avalanche winger Mike Keane, the “other” acquisition in the 1995 Patrick Roy trade, is still playing – but with the Manitoba Moose of the American Hockey League. At 39, he was captain of Team Canada in the AHL All-Star Game in Toronto last week and remained not at all sheepish about hanging on in the minors.
“It’s the best job in the world, so why stop?” he told the Toronto Sun. “I enjoy coming to the rink and playing at a high level. I don’t want to play just for the sake of playing. I want to compete and win and make the best of it.”
The Winnipeg-based Manitoba franchise is a Vancouver farm club, but his deal is with the Moose, not the Canucks. Winnipeg is his hometown, so winding down his career there makes sense, and there still is a slight chance an NHL team in need of a penalty-killing specialist could take him on late in the season. But if that doesn’t happen, Keane, who last played in the NHL with Vancouver in 2003-04, still would be content – and he would have the distinction of having been on Stanley Cup winners with three teams (Montreal, Colorado and Dallas).
Up the road
Rocky Mountain Rage coach Tracy Egeland, who is trying to make the most under trying circumstances of the first-year Central Hockey League franchise in Broomfield, was sitting near Joe Sakic on the Swift Current Broncos’ team bus in 1986 when it careened off a road and three of their teammates – Scott Kruger, Brent Ruff and Chris Mantyka – were killed.
“It’s something you never get out of your mind,” Egeland said at the Broomfield Event Center after a recent game. “It’s something you think about all the time. It changes you. You remember it and feel fortunate you’re still living today.”
Like Sakic, Egeland climbed through the broken front windshield to get out of the overturned bus. The three fatally injured players were sitting in the back, playing cards.
Let’s make a deal
The trading deadline is Feb. 27, when the Avalanche, for example, has 19 games remaining in the regular season. Though the odds against the Avalanche making the playoffs seem strong, it’s difficult to imagine a scenario in which Colorado will be out of contention for a spot by then and be in a position to trade off older players at the deadline.
So who might be available for the Avalanche, which will have some cap room because of the Long-Term Injury (LTI) status of Steve Konowalchuk and Patrice Brisebois?
Most intriguing possibility: the Blues’ Bill Guerin, who is making $2 million this season under a one-year deal. Doug Weight and Keith Tkachuk probably will be available for the right offers – or anything more than two puck buckets – but their cap numbers ($3.5 million and $5.7 million, respectively) are problems for teams without much room. The most intriguing de- fensemen who might be available are Boston’s Brad Stuart ($2.15 million) and the Blues’ Eric Brewer ($2 million).
SPOTLIGHT ON …
PANTHERS WINGER TODD BERTUZZI
Hold your boos.
Thirty-five months after his sucker punch and pile-driving of the Avalanche’s Steve Moore, the Florida right winger almost certainly won’t play Tuesday night when the Panthers face the Avalanche at the Pepsi Center.
Bertuzzi, traded from the Canucks to the Panthers for goalie Roberto Luongo in the offseason, hasn’t played since Oct. 18 and underwent surgery to repair a herniated disc Nov. 2.
He was expected to be out six to eight weeks, but when he resumed practicing with the Panthers after the all-star break, he said his target date for getting back in the lineup was “sometime in February.”
The Panthers now expect that to come sometime in the middle of the month, which would put him on track for a return for, or somewhere around, Florida’s Feb. 17 home game against Tampa Bay.
“He needs to practice with contact,” Panthers coach Jacques Martin, a former Avalanche assistant coach, told Miami reporters Thursday. “We’re going the right direction.”
Bertuzzi has one goal and six assists in seven games this season. The other possibility is that if he returns to the ice in mid-month, seems healthy and shows he could contribute to a potential playoff team, the Panthers could check out the market for him as the Feb. 27 trading deadline approaches. Bertuzzi’s cap number is $5.3 million this season, the final year of his four-year contract.
Moore, who suffered fractured neck vertebrae and a severe concussion in the attack in the third period of the game at Vancouver, has no goals and no assists in zero games since March 8, 2004.
His lawsuit against the Canucks, Canucks ownership and Bertuzzi is pending in Ontario. Moore and his parents, Jack and Anna Moore of Thornhill, Ontario, are seeking $19.5 million in damages.
Top 10
Polls close Friday morning:
(Rk. Prev. Team Comment)
1. 1 Sabres Sweep Bruins
2. 2 Ducks Bouncing back
3. 3 Predators 10-3 in January
4. 4 Red Wings In NYC on Monday
5. 5 Devils Add to Flyers’ woes
6. 7 Flames Reacquire Conroy
7. 10 Stars Win two at San Jose
8. 8 Canucks Fall to Jackets
9. 6 Sharks Teal wearing thin
10. – Thrashers In Denver on Thursday
Terry Frei can be reached at 303-954-1895 or tfrei@denverpost.com.
