As we have been painfully aware, the Avs have struggled on the road this year. However, in their most recent road trip, they won all four of their contests and finally have a winning road record of 18-14-5. The Avs were coming off a three-game winning streak before the start of the trip and now have won eight in a row and are undefeated since the trade deadline on March 8th. While the Avs played intense, solid hockey, there might be another factor in recent wins: I was there. Well, for two out of the four.  In 2019, my dad and I traveled to see the Avs play in Montreal and decided we wan ..read more

Alexandar Georgiev’s booked a trip to Mexico during the All-Star break, but fans said otherwise. Rather than tacos, it would be poutine for the netminder in Toronto to compete in his first All-Star Game. Georgiev leads the league in wins with 27; however, without a strong backup goalie, he also has the most starts with 41 and has faced criticism for his 116 goals allowed, which is the most in the league. The Avs have allowed the most goals but scored the most with 153. He is only the second Avs goalie to make an All-Star appearance, aside from Roy Nathan MacKinnon was among the elite players ..read more

We’ve survived (barely) two presidential elections, a pandemic, and eight different iPhone models since Partick Roy resigned dramatically as Avalanche head coach on August 11, 2016. Over seven years later, Roy is back in the spotlight behind the NHL bench as the New York Islanders head coach.  Patrick Roy has been making headlines across four decades after being drafted by the Montreal Canadiens in 1984. As a Quebec City native, he initially didn’t like the prospect of playing for the rival Canadiens, but his loyalty likely changed quickly once he hoisted his first Stanley Cup in his rook ..read more

Chug-a-chug-a choo choo invokes the image of a cartoon Thomas the Train creeping up a steep incline. However, the locomotive that has left the station is not the anthropomorphized tank but a 6’4” Russian hockey player. Valeri Nichuchkin, dubbed Big Val for his colossal frame, but more visually descriptive as a “Chu Chu train” for a ferocious style of play akin to a freight train bulldozing his way down the ice rather than the rails.  Coming off a career-high Stanley Cup run in 2022 with 52 points and 15 playoff points, where he played the final two games with a broken foot, the Avs resig ..read more

With the Avs 4-1 win against the Coyotes, making it two in a row after a disgruntling loss to the Chicago Blackhawks, we can officially go into the holiday with cheer. On that note, here is a little remake of the classically annoying song.  On the 1st Night of Hockey, our Captain gave to us… 1 Stanley Cup 2 Blind Refs 3 French Canadians  4 Blocked Shots 5 Minutes for Fighting 6 Teeth-a-missing  7 Swedes-a-skating 8 Makars-a-scoring 9 Mac Attacks 10 Dropped Gloves 11 Choo Choo Trains 12 Flashing Forwards  Next, the Avs will face a rematch with the desert dogs on December 2 ..read more

For those actively following the Avs, this is not breaking news, but despite this delayed post, it is still worth noting. Avalanche netminder Pavel Francouz, who has not played all season due to a lower-body injury, has returned home to the Czech Republic and will miss the rest of the year. At 33, this is the last year of his contract with the Avs, and if he does return to the NHL, it likely won’t be in burgundy and blue.  Throughout franchise history, the pipes have been guarded by greats like Roy, Varlamov, and Grubauer, and with the big names, it can be easy to overlook their backups ..read more

The Avalanche started the season 6-0, scoring 28 goals in six contests. With their sixth win versus the New York Islanders, they set an NHL record of 15 consecutive road wins, carrying over from the 2022 season. Things were going well. Then, the Avs entered PPG Arena to take on MacKinnon’s fellow Cole Harbor native, Sidney Crosby. There, the Pittsburg Penguins clogged up the Avalanche offense, and Tristin Jarry stopped all 31 shot attempts and gave the Penguins the shutout; the Avs lost 0-4.  While a shutout loss is never great, we can’t win every night. It is only one game. However, Sund ..read more

In the words of German singer Lou Bega,  One, two, three, four, five Everybody is in the car, so come on, let’s ride Lou Bega and his 1999 hit, “Mambo No. 5” That’s my way of saying that the Avs are 5-0 to start the season, a perfect start to the year, but honestly, I am more surprised that Lou Bega is German. They started the season on a three-game West Coast road trip, winning all three matches, and opened the season at home in a shutout victory over rookie Connor Bedard and the Chicago Blackhawks. Most recently, the Avs beat the Carolina Hurricanes in a high-flying 6-4 win. The Avalan ..read more

It is here. We made it. We survived over five months, 163 days, to be exact, without hockey. Five months with no Avs seemed incomprehensible after the previous season’s stretch that went till the end of June. Thankfully, the Nuggets kept the championship streak alive for Denver, and we celebrated in June once again. But on Wednesday night, the Avs will face off against the LA Kings, and life can return to normal.  The 2022-23 Avs started the season already missing two fundamental players from their Cup run: Kadri and Landeskog. Kadri signed with Calgary, and Landeskog never returned to t ..read more

Being a diehard sports fan comes with an emotional risk. No matter how loud you cheer, if you’re wearing the same jersey you wore for the last win, or standing in the kitchen because that’s where you were when your team scored before, the outcome of the game is out of your control. So I’m told. And when you’re eliminated in the first round of the playoffs as defending Stanley Cup Champions, it feels like you’ve been unexpectedly dumped rather than the proposal you were expecting. Studies show that it takes roughly three months for people to feel more positive post-breakup, and in hockey lives ..read more