Colorado Avalanche: 3 Keys to Their Building Momentum
The Avs are one of the youngest teams in the NHL.
The Avalanche are getting deeper before our eyes. There are players stepping up every game. On Friday, J.T. Compher stepped up with an unheard of two shorthanded goals on the same penalty kill. A quick search gives mixed results on whether that’s happened before in the NHL. I’ll choose to believe it has not.
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Youth can be a blessing and a curse in the NHL. The youthful sense of invincibility doesn’t survive the size-and-speed of the NHL game well. Young players get hurt. That makes the Avs health all the more surprising. Samuel Girard, Alexander Kerfoot, Nathan MacKinnon and Mikko Rantanen have been huge contributors for Colorado this season and they’ve also stayed healthy. Health is so incredibly key to a hockey season.
Assuming continued health, Colorado can expect an exciting brand of youthful, energetic hockey similar to what we’ve seen over the two-game blowout streak the Avs are currently on. You know, like the insane flip pass that Landeskog threw to Rantanen for the Avalanche third goal of the first period.
I’ve watched a lot of Avalanche hockey, a ton during their heyday, I’ve seen magic from Peter Forsberg and Joe Sakic. The combination of speed and vision that this team displays offensively is something I haven’t seen.
Those teams didn’t need a lot of camaraderie, not to say they didn’t share, they just had the talent to blow by most everybody. This is a different NHL and the Avalanche are tapping into the team concept and making it work for them: