Game 1: Not a Total Disaster

As a result of living overseas for four years and the Avs missing the post-season last year, until last night it had been six years since I saw a play-off game involving Colorado. That particular game was none other than the worst day in the history of the franchise—a Game Seven 7-0 pasting by the Red Wings, a miserable spectacle which neither I nor Phoff, who had joined me for the occasion, bothered to sit through to the bitter end.

For a while last night, it seemed like I had gone back in time. It was Joe Louis Arena again, it was Super Joe and Footer and Osgood and Draper and McCarthy again, and the Avs were awful again. When Franzen scored his second of the night to chase Theodore (who also seemed to have gone back in time, becoming once again the Jose Theodore of his first year and a half with the Avs), I was getting ready to find something more enjoyable to do, like prying off my fingernails with a toothpick.

But it turned out this game was different after all. Six years ago, the Avs didn’t show up at all. Last night, perhaps confused by the time difference, they simply showed up late—about an hour after the Red Wings, by which point it was too late, but at least they salvaged some dignity with their performance in the remainder of the game.

For the first period and a few minutes of the second, the Avs put on a clinic on how not to play Detroit. They were sloppy with the puck, they failed to clear the zone on numerous occasions, they let the Wings skate untouched through the neutral zone. Detroit looked like they could score on every rush up the ice.

A lot of this was due to the Avs’ defensive ineptitude, but credit goes to the Wings too—they are incredibly strong on the puck, they are great at creating space, they make smart, quick decisions, and they jumped all over every mistake the Avs made. They’re a great hockey team, no question.

But then Theodore was pulled, Osgood gave up a soft goal, and the momentum of the game gradually shifted. Smyth, Stastny, and Hejduk combined for the prettiest goal of the night to make it a one-goal game, and in the third period, despite only putting six shots on net, the Avs were all over the Wings, finishing their checks, keeping the puck in along the boards, and generating several good chances. After looking dangerous on every shift in the first period and change, the Wings barely got a look at Budaj’s goal for the remainder of the game, as the Avs got sticks and bodies in the way and stopped them from getting any kind of sustained pressure.

As one-sided as it had seemed early on, Cleary’s fluky first-period goal and Osgood’s big saves in the third, on Sakic and Liles in particular, ended up being the difference between the teams. That’s encouraging. If they put in the kind of effort they showed for the second half of yesterday’s game, and if Foppa returns and they get more from Joe Sakic and a very disappointing Andrew Brunette, there’s no question the Avs can compete with the Red Wings. The question is: Can they beat them? We’ll know more on Saturday.