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Friday, February 5, 1999
Red-hot Sakic has Avs rolling along
The Avalanche started the season 0-4 under rookie coach Bob Hartley and remained under .500 a full month into the season.
Fast forward to the present, and see the Avs reel off 10 straight victories heading into Friday night's game at Detroit.
Colorado's stars are shining again. Patrick Roy was the NHL's player of the month for January, Peter Forsberg, well, is Peter Forsberg, and captain Joe Sakic has re-captured his scoring touch.
Heading into Friday night's game, Sakic had 11 goals and 12 assists in 14 games since returning from a shoulder injury on Jan 2.
"Winning does solve everything," Sakic said Friday in a conference call.
"It just makes it a better environment."
Sakic says the talent was always there, but there were obstacles in October that made it hard to win.
"I think the biggest thing at the start of the year was the injuries we had to our defencemen," Sakic said, referring to injuries to Adam Foote and Sylvain Lefebvre, among others.
This season the Avalanche have lost 214-man games to injury. With 123 of them defencemen, Roy struggled behind the depleted blue line early in the season.
"As they say, you win with good defence and good goaltending. When you miss four to six of your front-line guys, it really sets you back," Sakic said.
"The first part of the year we were just trying to play well defensively and not give up too many scoring chances. On the offensive side, we weren't getting that many chances."
Sandis Ozolinsh's return appears to have been the key to the turnaround. The all-star defenceman ended a bitter contract dispute on Jan. 6 when he signed a multi-year deal. The Avs haven't lost since.
"Everybody was so pumped up when he got back," Sakic said. "He's such a big part of this team and he's a great guy."
"The way he plays the game, it really opens up the ice for the forwards. You know he's going to play 20-25 minutes a game and during that time you know you're always going to have that fourth guy coming in late in the play or leading the rush. He's so good at that."
Ozolinsh's more direct impact came on the power-play.
"Since Sandis has been here we've really been moving the puck well (on the power-play)," Sakic said. "He's been our quarterback for a number of years. When you get your quarterback back, it makes it a lot easier for everybody else."