LOVELAND — In late 2002, Colorado Eagles co-owner and general manager Ralph Backstrom gave me a tour of the under-construction Budweiser Events Center. Backstrom, the former NHL and World Hockey Association center and ex-University of Denver coach, had pull. We cheated. We didn’t wear hardhats. The next year, the Eagles began play in the Central Hockey League, and the full houses at the new arena quickly validated the minor-league hockey venture.
Through a move from the CHL to the ECHL, the Eagles have remained a popular member of the Fort Collins-Loveland-Windsor area’s sports scene, though sellouts in the 5,289-seat building no longer are automatic and the Eagles are averaging about 500 under that. The operation took a turn this season, when the Eagles finally became affiliated with the Avalanche. The neighbor NHL team doesn’t come close to stocking the Eagles’ full roster, though, and it more accurately is the spot where overflow players from the AHL San Antonio Rampage end up.
Under common ownership with the NBA’s Spurs, the Rampage plays at San Antonio’s AT&T Center, while the Avalanche hires and pays the staff and oversees the hockey part of the operation in the sport’s informal “AAA” level. This is the second season of that arrangement, and the previous one with the Cleveland-based Lake Erie Monsters was similar, with the AHL team playing in the same building (Quicken Loans Arena) as the NBA Cavaliers as part of owner Dan Gilbert’s portfolio. In line with the trend towards NHL teams owning and operating their own AHL franchises, the Avs obtaining and placing their own AHL franchise in Colorado Springs was given consideration, but one of the catches is that the World Arena seats 7,750 for hockey. At Cleveland and now at San Antonio, the Avs’ AHL farmhands have been playing in major-league arenas.
In contrast, at the “AA” level, the Eagles mostly procure their own talent, operating under an ECHL salary cap of $12,600 a week for players. They replaced the Fort Wayne Komets as the Avalanche’s ECHL affiliate, and the Eagles’ previous hookups were with Tampa Bay, Calgary and Winnipeg.
Chris Stewart has been with the Eagles since Day One, first as coach and now as president/general manager.
“The relationship with the Avalanche has been very good,” he said Friday. “Our communication is excellent. I have a real respect for what those gentlemen — (assistant GM) Craig Billington and the boss (Joe Sakic) — do. I find those two guys have a lot on their plate, but they have time for me.”
At Colorado’s sold-out 8-1 rout of Wichita on Friday, a retired Backstrom watched from a box as six Avalanche organizational players under AHL contracts suited up and the Eagles improved to 25-14-1-3. The six: goaltender Kent Simpson, 24; forwards Alex Belzile, 25, and Shawn St-Amant, 20; plus defensemen Cody Corbett, 23; Justin Hamonic, 22; and Sam Jardine, 23. All but Hamonic have spent time with the Rampage this season and Belzile and Corbett were sent down for their first Eagles stints in the past week. Belzile had five assists in his Eagles debut Friday. The Avs’ goaltending moves in the wake of Semyon Varlamov’s periodic absences with groin muscle issues and now his unavailability because of season-ending hip surgery led to ripple effects, and Simpson is expected to return to San Antonio in the next few days — when Spencer Martin, who went back down to play for the Rampage during the NHL All-Star break, rejoins the Avalanche.
“It wouldn’t be hard to see another one or two,” Stewart said of the Avalanche-supplied players with a laugh.
When a player under AHL contract to the Avs organization is sent to the Eagles, the ECHL team pays $525 per week of his salary and is charged only that against the $12,600 cap.
“It’s good for us,” Stewart said. “It gives us a chance to put a player down on the cap for far less than what he’s actually paid. If it delivers us a little more talent and skill, that’s great, and the fans love it.”
Last week, the Eagles lost their leading goal-scorer at the time, Jesse Mychan, when he left to take a more lucrative deal to play in Germany. Departures for Europe — this is Mychan’s second stint there — are one of the ECHL hazards. Also under an ECHL contract with the Eagles is forward Matt Garbowsky, a 2015 Hobey Baker Award finalist at R.I.T., and he had his fourth hat trick in a 10-game span against Wichita on Friday, getting him to 25 goals for the season.
On their own, the Eagles also brought in three players on the roster with listed Colorado hometowns — former University of Denver forward Luke Salazar (Thornton); journeyman defenseman and captain Sean Zimmerman (Denver); and former Princeton defenseman Michael Sdao (Niwot).
St-Amant signed as an undrafted free agent with the Avalanche organization after he won the Guy Carbonneau Trophy last season with the Val d’Or Foreurs as the Quebec Major Junior Hockey League’s top defensive forward. “In my mind, I was ready to not get drafted,” he said after the game Friday. “It wasn’t the end of the world. I just worked harder in the summer to try and prove them wrong.”
He could have returned to Val d’Or for an “over-age” season, and many undrafted players have done that and enhanced their free-agent status, drawing surprisingly good offers. “I spoke with my agent,” St-Amant said. “I think I did what I had to do in junior and I was ready to play (pro). The game’s tougher, faster.”
After signing, St-Amant attended the Avs’ rookie camp and the first part of training camp before being sidelined for a month with a groin muscle injury. In two stints with each of the Avs’ affiliates, he has played 11 games with San Antonio and 22 with the Eagles. In the Eagles’ 9-4 rout of Wichita on Saturday night, St-Amant had two goals and an assist, giving him seven goals and nine assists with the ECHL team.
“For sure, it was tough to get sent down the first time,” St-Amant said. “But I guess I understand and at least I’m playing here a lot. They trust me to do that, and I just want to get better. This is a fun place to play. The organization is a good one in the league. I take the positive out of it. I’m ready to get back up, but I’ll do my best here to help the guys win. We have a great hockey team here and it’s fun to win and to work hard.”
Spotlight on Avalanche morning skates
When: The remainder of the 2016-17 season
What’s up: After the all-star break, beginning Tuesday at Anaheim, the Avalanche has 36 games remaining — and will play them in the span of 69 days. In anticipation — and this likely will continue for the rest of the season — the Avalanche recently has gone to optional morning skates at home after team meetings. Also, for the most part the Avs have stopped going to the road arenas on game mornings and instead are holding team meetings at hotels, while players do aerobic work on their own there if they desire.
“We talked about it as a staff and with players,” Avalanche coach Jared Bednar said last week as the break approached. “As a group, we came to the decision.” Bednar added, “We’ve had lots of time to practice the first half of the year. After this break, we play every second night. We have to get work done and we have to get rest at the same time, so that’s what we want to do moving forward.”
Background: The morning skate’s genesis was as a roll call and hangover check and it now mostly is an accepted part of hockey’s routine. Some players, the real rink rats, love the skates. Others don’t, and for most long-tenured veterans, the on-ice part becomes semi-optional.
Frei’s take: If the Avalanche continues to be awful with this approach, of course, it will be a setup for the snide remarks. But I’ve long believed the morning skate — period — is unnecessary and even counterproductive, especially over the course of an 82-game season, and that players shouldn’t even be required to make two round trips to the arena on home game days. Every time I write about this, it brings out the defenders and traditionalists who cite everything from physiology and oxygenation to bonding and strategic reviews. Patrick Roy toyed with the idea of backing off morning skates early last season before going back to the more conventional approach, and other coaches have tried similar experiments over the years. The most notable this season is John Tortorella at Columbus.
