Three of the men in the Sharks’ HP Pavilion dressing room last week own Stanley Cup championship rings bearing the Avalanche logo.
Mike Ricci, the Sharks’ development coach, was wandering around in sweats. In the years since he played on the 1996 championship team, Ricci has been one of the standards used to explain just how loaded Colorado’s Stanley Cup teams were, as in: “Not a bad third-line center, eh?”
Claude Lemieux, the stir-the-drink and tick-off-opponents winger on the 1996 Cup winners, was getting ready to return to the lineup that night against the Avalanche after missing 18 games with a cracked jawbone.
Rob Blake, the bedrock defenseman with the booming shot from the point who joined Colorado in time for the 2001 championship run, returned to the Sharks’ lineup last week after missing five games with a pulled muscle.
Ricci first joked that his job now involves “a little bit of this, a little bit of that,” and then added: “No, it’s been great this year because I’ve been working a lot with our players and coaches, and also going a lot to our farm club in Worcester and working with those players and those coaches.”
He said he also has been helping out with scouting duties, especially of college free agents, but also of the prospects the Sharks already have drafted. “I’m still doing some community stuff, too, and it’s good to give back,” he said. “It’s kept me out of trouble.”
Ricci had a significant role in the excellent 2005 movie, “The Rocket,” about Canadiens star Maurice Richard, playing Richard’s Montreal linemate Elmer Lach. The movie, primarily in French, wasn’t available on DVD to the U.S. market (with English subtitles) until late 2007. Ricci’s lines were in English and subtitled in the original release. The most jarring thing in the movie was seeing Ricci, whose hair now is near shoulder-length again, with a 1940s hairstyle.
“I don’t know if Steven Spielberg was going to be beating down my door,” Ricci said. “I never thought I’d be in a movie, but that’s how hockey’s been good to me. I’ve been able to do a bunch of different things. The movie was fun, but a lot of work.
“They told me my hair would be medium-length. But when I got there and I saw the director of the movie waiting for me in the makeup room, I knew something fishy was going on. I knew it wasn’t going to be medium. It was short, and I had to grease it up.”
Lemieux’s time off with the jaw problem was short compared to his retirement of five years before he returned this season and eventually earned his way back to the NHL with the Sharks.
“I see myself in a fourth-line role and then anything can happen,” Lemieux said. “Depending on my play, I see opportunities all over. Whatever the team needs, I feel I’m capable and able to help them out, whatever the situation is.”
Blake, meanwhile, has had a solid year after signing a $5 million, one-year deal last summer. He turned 39 in December. If he seems to be holding off the turning of the calendar better than he did in his second tour of the duty with the Kings, he says there are good reasons.
“You get stuck in some situations, there’s not much you can do,” he said. “As far as how I’m playing, I don’t think it’s any different than in the past. But you’re surrounded by a real good team here.”
In regard to the perception that his game was slipping during his time at Los Angeles, he said: “Didn’t bother me. If you look at the age and the stats, that’s what they’re going to say. That’s fine. But when I talked to (general manager) Doug Wilson, he filled me in on what this team’s all about, and it seemed very similar to the move to Colorado for me. It was going into a real good setting that was supposed to go to the playoffs.”
After winning the Presidents’ Trophy, the Sharks will have home-ice advantage through the playoffs under first-year coach Todd McLellan. That’s far from a guarantee of postseason success in the NHL, but the former Avs have bona fide chances of earning additional championship rings.
Spotlight on …
Giving the best in the NHL their due
Voting for NHL regular-season awards will be conducted in the next few days, and ballots have to be in by the time the puck is dropped in the playoffs.
Last week, I let it slip that if I had a vote for coach of the year, it would go to St. Louis’ Andy Murray. But the league’s broadcasters vote on that award.
Here’s how I’ll be voting on the league’s top awards:
Hart Trophy (MVP): Alex Ovechkin, Washington.
This might end up going to Pittsburgh’s Evgeni Malkin, especially if he winds up leading the league in points, but Ovechkin is going to be the only player to surpass 50 goals and he deserves a repeat win. Boston goalie Tim Thomas also will get some support.
Norris Trophy (top defenseman): Zdeno Chara, Boston.
Detroit’s Nicklas Lidstrom had won the award in six of the past seven seasons, but Chara deserves to be a landslide choice this time.
Calder Trophy (top rookie): Steve Mason, Columbus.
Anaheim’s Bobby Ryan and St. Louis’ Patrik Berglund would have shots at this most years, but Mason’s work in helping lift the Blue Jackets to their first playoff berth makes this a tap-in.
Terry Frei, The Denver Post
