Sylvain Lefebvre was a reliable, stay-at-home defenseman on an Avalanche team so remarkable it will be honored on Colorado’s 2010-11 opening night on Thursday at the Pepsi Center.
The 1995-96 Stanley Cup champions brought Colorado its first major-league championship in the team’s inaugural season in Denver, and Lefebvre was an important cog on a roster that included “bigger” names such as Joe Sakic, Patrick Roy and Peter Forsberg.
“Just to see everybody again at once, that will be quite a thrill,” Lefebvre said.
After the pregame ceremonies, Lefebvre will step behind the Colorado bench to deploy, prod and encourage the Avalanche defensemen in the season opener against the Chicago Blackhawks. One of the many ironies will be that the man who filled that role as an assistant coach for the 1995-96 Avalanche, Joel Quenneville, is the head coach of the Blackhawks, the reigning Cup champions.
Lefebvre, 42, is in his second season on Avalanche coach Joe Sacco’s staff. The two men were teammates in the early 1990s with the Toronto Maple Leafs. Lefebvre rejoined the Avalanche organization in 2006, keeping tabs on prospects for a year, then served as Sacco’s assistant with the Lake Erie Monsters of the American Hockey League for two seasons. They moved to the Avalanche together before the 2009-10 season. Tonight they close out the seven-game exhibition season against the Los Angeles Kings in Las Vegas.
“Right from the get-go, we were on the same page as far as how to get a team ready,” Lefebvre said. “We’ve worked together for four years now, and he knows what I’m thinking, and I know what he’s thinking.”
Lefebvre stands behind the defensemen at the end of the bench and makes the deployment decisions.
“As far as making the changes and the pairings on the back end during a game, that’s his call,” Sacco said. “There might be a point in the game where I’ll want a different pairing out there or I’m looking for some offense, but he knows situations during the games and who needs to be out there and who doesn’t need to be out there.
“He played the position and played it well for a long time. He was one of those players who had to pay attention to details and do all the little things well.”
Lefebvre is a native of Richmond, Quebec, who spent three seasons with the Canadiens and two with the Maple Leafs before his five years with the Quebec-Colorado franchise. Finishing up with four seasons with the Rangers, he played in 945 NHL games. Bilingual and generally softspoken, it also helps that he can communicate in French with Colorado’s French-Canadian prospects and organizational players.
“At the end of my career, I didn’t really know what I wanted to do, but I wanted to at least try coaching and see if I liked it,” Lefebvre said. “I tried it, and I was hooked. I love working with the young guys and staying in the game.”
Lefebvre said he has done considerable reading the last couple of years about communication and the mental part of the game. “Every player knows they have to work, but the big difference at this level here is what goes on between your ears,” he said. “It’s the 6-inch rule, the distance between your ears. For young players, especially, it’s about preparation and knowing how to react to different situations, how you come out of slumps, how to react to bad shifts.”
Avalanche captain Adam Foote is the only current Colorado player who was on the 1995-96 Cup champions, and he was a teammate of Lefebvre’s for five seasons.
“He had a good decade there where he was considered one of the best shutdown defensemen in the game,” Foote said. “He was committed to playing the right way, and I think he brings that into his coaching. He can really read a team and give you good advice on how to play.”
Veteran Scott Hannan, 31, is old enough to have played against Lefebvre.
“When you played the game as long as he did, you’re able to read how guys are playing, read the situations and get the right guys out there,” Hannan said. “He did an excellent job of that last year, of reading the bench and playing guys.
“You can go to him with questions, too, and feel confident about what he says to you. He gives you confidence.”
Avalanche defenseman John-Michael Liles was a healthy scratch for nine games last season, so he wasn’t always on the same page with Lefebvre. “I think there’s only so much a coach can say to you until you have to kind of sort out the crosswires in your own head, and that’s something I needed to do,” Liles said. “He was obviously supportive in terms of trying to help me any way he could, showing me video, walking me through it shift by shift, anything, giving me things to work on. I think it all helped.
“I think he’s that kind of assistant coach you look to for help, whether it’s good times or bad times.”
Terry Frei: 303-954-1895 or tfrei@denverpost.com
On the defensive
The Avalanche has had only three assistant coaches in charge of the defensemen during the team’s 15 years in Denver. A look:
JOEL QUENNEVILLE
1995-96 and first half of 1996-97.
Took over as head coach of the St. Louis Blues in January 1997.
JACQUES CLOUTIER
January 1997 through the 2008-09 season.
Served under head coaches Marc Crawford, Bob Hartley, Tony Granato and Quenneville.
SYLVAIN LEFEBVRE
2009-10 season to present.
