As If We Needed Another Reason

As if we needed another reason to attend the home opener, the Avalanche have announced that they will be having a reunion for the 1995-96 Stanley Cup winning team. A lot of details are still to be released, but they did say that they will be honoring the team prior to the team's home opener on October 7th vs. the Chicago Blackhawks (whose head coach conveniently is Joel Quenneville, one of the Avs' assistant coaches back in '96).

It's only been since April that we've been able to attend an Avs game, so it's not like any of us were itching to go to the home opener anyway. Last year, it was Joe Sakic's jersey retirement ceremony and this year it's going to be honoring Denver's first professional sports championship team. The Avs may be establishing a new tradition of holding a big celebration every year when the season begins. Even if they don't plan to continue this trend, it should be a fun night for fans to see the original Avalanche team that came to Denver and won our hearts.

View the article on the Avs official site here.

Is Summer Over Yet?

August is probably the longest month of the summer for hockey fans. Even if your team is eliminated early or don't even make the playoffs, you can watch the rest of the playoffs through early June. Usually, Avs fans would have had the opportunity to attend or at least read about a prospect development camp in July. At least there was free agency (although that wasn't terribly exciting this year), and the announcement of the Burgundy and White game and the opportunity to buy tickets.

The only excitement we really have in August is that it is the last month where we have no hockey. September brings with it training camp, the Burgundy and White game, and the pre-season. Of course, the time we are all really looking forward to is the start of the regular season in early October. The season opens with the Avs hosting the 2010 Stanley Cup champion Chicago Blackhawks on October 7th.

Over the summer, we have said good bye to a few players, none really unexpected: Brett Clark and Chris Durno who went to Tampa Bay, Ruslan Salei who went to Detroit, and goaltending prospect Tyler Weiman went to Vancouver. Darcy Tucker was unsurprisingly not offered a new contract and remains as a free agent. Matt Hendricks is also still a free agent. According to Adrian Dater earlier this summer, Hendricks was made an offer by the Avs, but it was not what he was hoping for and he wanted to test the market. It's looking unlikely that he will return.

Then there were the players who returned to the Avs. Prior to free agency, the Avs announced the signings of Captain Adam Foote, goaltender Peter Budaj and left wing David Koci. Brandon Yip and Kyle Quincey both signed 2 year contracts to remain with the Avs after July 1st. Shortly before the start of free agency, the Avs traded a 2012 4th round draft pick to Phoenix for left wing Daniel Winnik. They also signed him to a 2 year contract this summer. Chris Stewart and Peter Mueller have still not signed contracts with the Avs, but are both restricted free agents. The Avs should re-sign them both, but whether or not they will still remains to be seen.

The Avs will definitely have to make some signings because they are still below the league's cap floor. That's right, not only is there a salary cap, but a salary floor, a minimum amount that the team has to spend. The Avs have not even met that salary minimum yet. With training camp starting up in about a month on September 17th (the date veterans report for physicals), it seems likely that the Avs will sign a couple more players prior to then.

The summer has been long and rather boring, with no big free agents being signed by the Avs because they didn't feel that they needed any. The argument could also be made that they don't want to spend a lot of money on big name free agents because they have so many young players who will be earning bigger contracts in the next couple of years. If you follow the NHL in general, the most interesting story was probably the ridiculous contract between Ilya Kovalchuk and the Devils which was ultimately rejected. If you are only interested in the Avalanche though, it was not a terribly exciting summer. The good news is that we are only a month away from training camp and less than 2 months away from the start of the regular season.

More Returning Players

With the July 1st free agency date just over a month away, the Avs have announced the signing of two more players to new contracts. Backup goaltender Peter Budaj and left winger David Koci each signed a one year deal for the upcoming 2010-2011 season.

Budaj has been with the Avs for five seasons as both a starting goaltender and a backup. This last season, Budaj served as the backup for Craig Anderson and appeared in 15 games. When he was not playing, Budaj was still busy on the bench watching the other team's shooters and telling Anderson about their shooting tendencies. He would also consult with the Avs shooters during a shootout and let them know the opposing goaltender's weak spots.

Last season was Koci's first year as an Av and a career high for him. He appeared in 43 games, more than any previous season in his NHL career. He was not shy about dropping the gloves while on the ice.

2009-2010 Season Tribute

Unfortunately there's not a whole lot of interest going on with the Avs right now. Starting this blog near the end of the season means it will probably be slow and uninteresting for a while. In the meantime, I will try to come up with some interesting posts.

Shortly after the Avs were knocked out of the playoffs, I went through my pictures/videos from going to games this season and put together a video. It starts on Joe Sakic night and continues throughout the regular season.



If you feel the need for music, the song I put in the clip was "The Pretender" by Foo Fighters. I cut the song out so that I wouldn't infringe on any copyrights. All of the photos/videos were shot by yours truly. I hope you enjoyed!

The Captain Returns

The Avs announced today that they have signed Captain Adam Foote to a one year contract for the 2010-2011 season. This signing is no surprise since Foote said earlier that he was definitely interested in playing for another year with the team. He is only the second team captain in Avalanche history and will continue to lead the team with his veteran presence for at least one more season.

On July 1, 2010 the free agency period will begin for the NHL and between now and then, the Avs will be able to negotiate contracts with the restricted and unrestricted free agents if they wish to re-sign them. The restricted free agents are: Peter Mueller, Kevin Porter, Brandon Yip, Chris Stewart and Kyle Quincey. The unrestricted free agents are: Stephane Yelle, Matt Hendricks, Chris Durno, Darcy Tucker, David Koci, Marek Svatos, Brett Clark, Ruslan Salei, and Peter Budaj. I might be skipping somebody, but that's who is up for a new contract during this off-season.

Another One

Avalanche defenseman Ruslan Salei will also be heading over to Germany for the World Hockey Championship, starting this Friday, May 7th. Salei will don the captain's C for Team Belarus, just as he did at this year's Olympics.

Also heading to German is defensive prospect Jonos Holos who also represented the Avs for Team Norway in the Olympics.

The Good News Is...

The season is over for the Avalanche, but the good news is some of the team are not done with hockey just yet. The first round elimination from the NHL playoffs has led to a good thing for some of the guys. Several members of the Avalanche will be representing their respective countries at the International Ice Hockey Federation (IIHF) World Championship to be held in Germany this year. The championship starts on May 7th and will last a couple weeks until May 23rd.

Representing Team USA will be forward T.J. Galiardi who was born in Canada, but much like his roommate Paul Stastny, has dual-citizenship and elected to play internationally for Team USA. This will mark Galiardi's first appearance for Team USA in international play as he never previously made the team's cut at the junior level. Joining Galiardi for Team USA will be Avalanche head coach Joe Sacco, who will serve as an assistant coach for USA in the IIHF World Championship.

The Avalanche will also have two representatives on Team Canada when the World Championship starts next Friday in Germany. Rookie sensation and Calder Trophy nominee Matt Duchene will be lacing up his skates for his country. Duchene has previously won a medal with the Under-18 Canada team. Joining Duchene on Canada's roster will be speedy Avs defenseman Kyle Cumiskey. This will mark the first team Cumiskey has put on Team Canada's jersey in international play.

In other good news, Matt Duchene will not be the only member of the Avalanche who will be up for an award on June 23rd. When the NHL convenes in Las Vegas to host it's end of the year awards, Duchene will be up for the Calder Trophy as the league's outstanding rookie. Also nominated was head coach Joe Sacco who will be up for the Jack Adams award for the best coach in the league.

The nomination is quite an honor and a nod to Sacco's unexpected success at establishing his young team as a force to be reckoned with in the tough Western Conference. The Avs were not expected to be a playoff contender until much further down the road, but Sacco coached his team full of rookies and mostly under 25 players to the 8th seed. While they were ultimately knocked out by the San Jose Sharks in the first round, the Avs and coach Sacco gave them a run for their money.

Congratulations again to Joe Sacco for his Jack Adams nomination and to Matt Duchene for his Calder nomination. Hopefully they will be bringing home some hardware, but even if they don't, it's nice that they are getting some deserved recognition.

Good luck to the Avs three young stars Matt Duchene, Kyle Cumiskey and T.J. Galiardi who will be skating for their countries in Germany and also to Team USA assistant coach Joe Sacco. The NHL season ended too early for the Avs, but some of the boys will be able to extend their hockey for a little bit longer anyway. It must always be fun to represent their own country in international play too. Go Team USA! Go Team Canada (but mostly go Team USA!).

To learn more about the IIHF and the 2010 Men's World Championship and to follow the action you can visit: www.iihf.com

*All images in this post were taken by me and you must ask permission to use them elsewhere*