Cody McLeod will step into Nathan MacKinnon’s spot on the top line (AAron Ontiveroz, The Denver Post)
In the wake of the Avalanche disclosure that , missing the rest of the regular season, this should be pointed out for form sake: In the case of an Avalanche miraculous closing run, six weeks would take him to April 17, or during the first round of the playoffs, and eight weeks would about coincide with the start of the second round.
The attitude in the dressing room, of course, is that this is another bump, but that the playoffs still are attainable and the wording of the Avalanche announcement — phrasing it that there still could be more hockey for MacKinnon to play — is in line with that. Same thing, perhaps, with the possible return of defenseman Erik Johnson who, as the story noted, skated for the first time Friday following his arthroscopic knee procedure in late January. Common sense might seem to dictate that if the Avs are destined to miss the playoffs, Johnson might as well remain out of the lineup, and it will be interesting to see where things stand if he’s at least physically close to being able to play in two more weeks.
With the two-game road trip beginning at Columbus Saturday, the Avalanche knows that looking ahead to Sunday at Minnesota would be counterproductive and certainly contrary to the one-game-at-a-time mantra Roy — and every other coach in the free world — pushes.
But it’s likely that the NHL has let it be known it will be paying close attention to what happens Sunday at Minnesota in the wake of the events of the final seconds last Saturday in Denver — leading to fines being levied by the league to Cody McLeod and Gabriel Landeskog — and the verbiage going back and forth since. I’m not saying the situations are exactly parallel, but that there are some similar notes being sounded here: Sunday is the 11th anniversary of the infamous Canucks-Avalanche game in Vancouver. What tends to be overlooked in that is there was a buildup, including yapping back and forth.
On Friday, Roy answered “not at all” when asked he expected emotions to overflow in the game at Minnesota Sunday. He added, “We’re going to focus on Columbus tomorrow. But we’re going there (Minnesota) to win a hockey game. Revenge or whatever is not part of what we’ve been doing. If we were talking about revenge, we would have done something way before that when they hurt (Tyson) Barrie. To me, it’s be ready for them and play a strong game. To me, garbage is what (Matt) Cooke did to Barrie, not what McLeod did at the end of the game.”
Jarome Iginla, no shrinking violet on the ice, but a respected leader and professional, has been through emotional rivalry games many times, including in the Battle of Alberta.
“We haven’t even talked about it,” he said of the heating-up nature of the matchup with the Wild. “It’s part of the game. Honestly, I didn’t really think it was that bad. It’s a physical, intense game and we’re in the same division. And the way the playoffs went last year, when a team puts another out, you don’t like each other. But no, I think it’ll be us trying to win and them trying to win, intense and physical…But, no, nobody’s planning anything or anything like that. Sometimes things appear a little bit more intense, but I didn’t think it was that bad.”
Landeskog said, “We have to be professional and stay focused. I think for us, it’s about winning hockey games, whether we’re playing against Minnesota or Columbus or anybody. It’s still the same goal, to get two points.”
Terry Frei: tfrei@denverpost.com or twitter.com/TFrei
