The Colorado Avalanche were back on the ice for the second day in a row on Sunday. They’ll take the day off Monday before practicing once more at Ball Arena on the eve of the Western Conference Finals Game 1 against the Vegas Golden Knights.
My focus was to learn more about what head coach Jared Bednar is expecting from the Golden Knights. You can find that story below. But there were also quite a few updates on the ice that are worthy of writing about.
Defenseman Alex Gagne was on the ice for the Avs’ practice. The 6-foot-4, 225lb left-shot blueliner helped round out what was a depleted back line for practice the previous day.
In his first pro season, Gagne appeared in 58 regular-season games for the AHL’s Colorado Eagles. He also has two goals in eight postseason games. He has not yet made his NHL debut. But that’s something that could happen against the Golden Knights, if Bednar needs to use another defenseman.
“Gagne has played excellent in his first year with the Eagles, and he’s a big, strong guy,” Bednar said. “We saw a big bottom six in Minny, we’re going to see a big bottom six out of Vegas.”
On the ice for practice, the Avs had Devon Toews, Brett Kulak, Nick Blankenburg, and Jack Ahcan. Those are the same four guys who took part in Saturday’s entire skate. They also had Josh Manson and Sam Malinski as full participants — both of whom were on the ice in limited roles the day before. Add Gagne to the mix, and they were able to go through drills with plenty of defensemen.
It’s a big step for Malinski, who also shed the non-contact sweater after missing the last two games of the second round.
Still absent from the skate were Brent Burns and Cale Makar. Makar hasn’t taken part in any non-game skates for a couple of weeks. Burns had been on the ice regularly until these last two days. He, like Makar, hasn’t missed a playoff game all year. And he was also on the ice when Kulak scored the overtime series-clincher on Wednesday.
Is it anything to be concerned about? Not quite. And the same can be said about the absence of Artturi Lehkonen.
“We’ve got some banged-up guys, we’ll see where our health gets to,” Bednar said. “I think everyone’s going to be available, but we’ll see.”
