Montreal Beats Avalanche, McKinnon Steals Show

In a homecoming for the Canadian born players and coaches, the Avalanche began a 3 game, 4 day, far north tour of duty tonight starting in Montreal with the Canadiens.

We expected Matt Duchene to get the heroes welcome as well as Canadian born JS Giguere who got the call in goal.  We even expected the love and admiration that this team would bestow on the goalie who last captured the Stanley Cup for Montreal (1993), the team with the most of them all.  Patrick Roy has a storied career that began with Montreal. With so many years removed, the rift that caused him to go is all but healed. Today, Roy is nothing but beloved in Montreal...as he should be.

What was not expected tonight by anyone except those in Canada and from Canada, was the warm reception given to the NHL's front running Rookie of the Year, Nathan McKinnon.

These Canadians are serious about their hockey as the recent Olympic victories suggested.  After being dead in the water in the semi-final game against the USA, Canada women's team rallied late to push the game to OT and won it in the extra period.  The men's team followed that feat a few days later by winning the gold as well. Winning hockey in Canada is about as important as basketball is to the USA.  They simply expect to win.

Thanks to their blind passion for hockey, the Canadiens proceeded to piss off  Patrick (who was struggling at the time), forcing Roy to demand a release.  When the breakup was over, Avalanche had a Hall of Fame goalie and would gain two Stanley Cup victories with him in net.

Montreal was glad to see the return of Roy, but hardly ready to hand over a much needed victory.  The respectful applause for McKinnon appeared to inspire something special into his legs.  Everything they admired in McKinnon as expert hockey fans was on display in this game. McKinnon would eventually take #2 star of the game even though the Avalanche lost 6-3.

Losing teams are not awarded #1 stars as a matter of form, but McKinnon was clearly the best player on the ice.  Thomas Vanek of Montreal got the #1 star with an ugly hat trick that didn't even draw one hat from his home crowd, who remained mesmerized as McKinnon skated circles around their team.  Undoubtedly, Canadien fans walked from the arena happy with a win, but exuberant over the show McKinnon gave them as well.

There is admiration, and then there is admiration from fan's who really know what they are watching.  If you didn't realize what the rest of the league thought of Colorado's super rookie, you do now.  Canadiens tested....Canadiens approved.

POST SCRIPT: Avalanche forward John Mitchell lost his skates while rushing up ice, slid into the boards and bounced off so violently he went airborne from the ricochet.  Mitchell, who skated off on his own power, was transported to a local hospital for precautionary x-rays.  (No injury report was available at publishing).

Sidney Crosby's Canadians Clean Up On Winter Olympic Ice To Complete Hockey Sweep

Don't think a black man can't love hockey.  If ice wasn't so cold, we might have already taken over that sport as well.  I spent quite a few nights playing some intense roller blade variety of the sport, so I relate to it very well.  My oldest daughter chose roller hockey over basketball, and I am a basketball coach.

With that being said, hockey is still a marginal sport to some degree.  It relies on the playoffs and the Olympics to promote the game, especially in America. Here in Denver, if the Colorado Avalanche are not really in contention, they become a bit less than background noise.  Right now, they are not only in contention, my Avalanche represented the best of the NHL in the Winter Olympics.

The Russian's may have won the most medals in the winter Olympics, but men's hockey wasn't one, as Avalanche goalie Semyon Varlamov and the Russian team fell outside of medal contention.  The Americans and Av's forward Paul Stastny, made a strong push for a medal but couldn't overcome a bitter semifinal loss to win the bronze medal match either.

When the gold medal match arrived, my heart was rooting for Avalanche Gabriel Landiskog and the Swedish team, but my head knew that they had a juggernaut to overcome in the eventual gold medal team from Canada.  Matt Duchene may not be the best Avalanche player even though he is getting a lot of votes in the (non-black) barbershop as such.  After his team dominated the gold medal rush, he will certainly have best of the world bragging rights for the next four years.

The story line if any other Olympic Av had won the gold in hockey would have been so much less predictable than another Canadian victory.  To their credit, they certainly faced the kind of competition that challenged their hockey dominance.  The Canadian team played the game the right way and got better with each shift.  No, really.

By the end of this tournament, the Swedish team that Canada faced played well enough to win the gold themselves, but it was like all of those teams that lost to Jordan and the Chicago Bulls; Sweden was simply outmatched in speed, desire and chemistry.

After a crushing defeat to the women's Canadian hockey
team, the men had to win a "loser takes Justin Beiber" bet.

Most important to this gold medal run was the power of agreement at work for this team.  They simply agreed to trust in the immense level of talent and grind harder than any other team.  When you know that every player on your left or right is just as talented and driven as you are, there is a dynamic stronger than chemistry; there is a synergy that occurs.  Both the American and the Swedish goalie played amazing hockey.  Truly amazing, because the Canadian onslaught demanded it.  No, really.

In hindsight, I am not sure how the Canadians did not win both the semifinal and the final game by a larger margin than they did.  They simply continued to get better when every other team squeezed their potential to its maximum.

I am totally glad that at least one of my Av's players will get to show off a gold medal around the locker room, I just wish that Justin Beiber wasn't an additional reminder of our defeat.