Urgency comes home to Wild

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Wild center Wes Walz
'Our playoffs are right now.'
Only 23 games remain to make the playoffs



DENVER ? Todd White anticipated the question before it could be asked.
"Is this the biggest game of the season?" White wanted to know Monday about the Wild's post-Olympic debut tonight against the Colorado Avalanche.
No, because a similar case could be made for the next game. Then the one after that. And so on.
That is the reality of being five points out of a playoff spot with 23 games remaining as the Wild urgently charge into the seven-week stretch drive.
"Our playoffs are right now," center Wes Walz said.
Those playoffs start against the Avalanche, who are 4-1 against the Wild this season, and continue later this week with back-to-back games at Los Angeles and Anaheim.
"We know we've got a lot of ground to make up," Walz said. "Guys talking about how many wins we need. We need one win (tonight). That's all we've got to look forward to, and then we'll worry about the next game when it comes."
The pressure to make a run is immediate with the Olympic roster freeze lifted and the trade deadline looming in nine days. General manager Doug Risebrough is scheduled to join the Wild today, and their play could determine by the end of the trip whether he will be a buyer or seller in the market.
The five points separating the Wild from eighth-seeded Edmonton loom larger with the Mighty Ducks wedged in between and the Oilers holding a game in hand. Moreover, the remaining intraconference schedule means fierce battles for limited points, with overtime and shootout losses provoking pivotal swings in the standings.
Just 10 points separate the fifth through 11th teams in the Western Conference. The Wild are a point ahead of the San Jose Sharks, who have three crucial games in hand.
The pursuing Wild have three games remaining against Edmonton and two more against Colorado, Calgary and Los Angeles.
"The best thing is we're playing teams that we're chasing, so we have the opportunity to move up without having to get any help from somebody else," White said. "It's going to be up to us these last 23 games whether we make the playoffs or not."
A key for the Wild will be to improve on the momentum they had before the Olympics. They were playing their best hockey of the season and went 17-10-1 in the two months leading up to the break. They will need to be even better to have a shot at the playoffs.
Still, they have come a long way from their rudderless days in mid-December, when they were wallowing under .500 and fading fast.
"We're playing better than I thought we would," coach Jacques Lemaire said. "At a time there, it was looking bad. Now at least, you look at the team, hopefully that's how we're going to look from now until the end of the season. We know we can look like that. We can be that team. Just got to get it together."
One player whose game has come together is Marian Gaborik. It's no surprise the Wild are a better team when their most talented player is at his best, as Gaborik was before and during the Olympics.
Gaborik's 12 goals since the calendar flipped to 2006 are the fourth-most in the league. He had 16 points in 14 games leading up to the break. In Turin, he scored three goals among seven points for Slovakia and was among the most dominant forwards on the ice during the tournament.
Despite playing eight games in 12 days and traveling long distances to and from Italy, Gaborik has skated well and looked sharp practicing the past two days in Denver. He is poised to lead the charge.
"I'm looking forward to this. When you feel good, and the team's going good, that's very important," he said. "I just want to help as much as I can and hopefully get that confidence going. If we're going to make

 

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colorado avalanche
Letdown in the mix?


Milan Hejduk's equipment bag was still in transit, but the Avalanche veteran right winger was back at the Family Sports Center on Monday, displaying the bronze medal he won in Turin as a member of the Czech Republic's Olympic team.

Heck, if the 30-year-old Hejduk plays another four years - and there's no reason to believe he won't - he could go for a silver at the 2010 Games and complete a set. His gold medal from the 1998 Games in Nagano, he said, is back in his homeland, locked away.

Though Hejduk didn't skate Monday, most of the nine Avalanche Olympians were at the practice rink - all, in fact, except for Canadians Joe Sakic and Rob Blake, and winger Antti Laaksonen, who had to settle for a silver medal after Finland's 3-2 loss to Sweden in the championship game Sunday.

Now it's back to work.

The Avalanche has 23 regular-season games remaining, beginning with tonight's meeting with the Minnesota Wild at the Pepsi Center. It starts the stretch run in the No. 6 spot in the Western Conference, within three points of Calgary and the Northwest Division lead - but also only five points ahead of the first nonplayoff team, the Mighty Ducks of Anaheim. The division winner is guaranteed at least the No. 3 seed.

So the Avalanche ending up with home ice in the first round, or missing the postseason altogether for the first time in the franchise's Colorado history, remain realistic possibilities.

In this kind of race, a post-Olympics hangover would be debilitating for the Avalanche - or virtually any other bubble team in the league. Even the Detroit Red Wings, who also had nine Olympians (including three on the gold-medal winning Swedish roster) and seem to have a division title all but wrapped up, could slip if Henrik Zetterberg, Tomas Holmstrom and Nicklas Lidstrom have some streaks of gold-gilded letdown down the stretch. And in the East, the Ottawa Senators - who got off to a terrific start but have been mediocre in the New Year - will be sweating over whether the groin injury goalie Dominik Hasek suffered in Turin will keep him out of the lineup long or diminish his effectiveness after he returns.

It's not outlandish to wonder about whether a post-Olympic malaise could strike in Colorado, considering the huge Avalanche contingent to Turin - and such overlooked things as defenseman Karlis Skrastins playing marathon minutes as one of two NHL players on overmatched Latvia's roster.

So can the Avs get their heads - and hearts - back in the NHL game soon enough to at least solidify a playoff position, if not take over the Northwest Division lead?

"I don't think it's going to be that bad," Hejduk said. "We're battling for a playoff spot right now, and I have to focus on that and try to help the team."

Said Skrastins: "Oh, I even had that feeling today at practice, that I am back. I think all the guys who have come back will be ready right away."

John-Michael Liles and his U.S. teammates were ousted in the quarterfinals, the same round as the Canadians.

He played six games in Turin and returned to Denver on Friday.
"It's over with," Liles said Monday. "There's nothing I can do now. My job is to help the Avalanche....I think everybody here is professional. I think there are guys who are going to be tired and have jet lag. I know I still have a little bit of it. But the bottom line is to put your mind in the right place and be ready to play."

Of course, some of the post-Olympics talk can focus on one team and ignore the reality that most teams are in similar positions. Even the Wild, the fifth-place team in the Northwest, had five Olympians: Filip Kuba of the Czech Republic, Mikko Koivu of Finland, Marian Gaborik of Slovakia, Daniel Tjarnqvist of Sweden, and Brian Rolston of the United States.

So every team in the league has had players drifting back to town since practices resumed Thursday.

"We've placed the emphasis the last couple of days almost like a refreshing course," Avalanche coach Joel Quenneville said. "Everybody's mind's been in different places the last couple of weeks....Basically, you just have to get everyone's focus and attention right off the bat."

Can that be accomplished?

"We hope so," Quenneville said. "We don't have a lot of games left. I think certainly the guys who have been here are certainly looking forward to getting a chance to play. The guys who were there, they have to get readapted to our system and our game.

"But they're all pros. They're all talented players, so we expect them all to immediately recapture that sense and that feeling."

Putting too much stock in history can be risky because the Avalanche has undergone such major personnel changes over the past eight years. But the previous two times the NHL shut down - for the Nagano Games in 1998 and for the Salt Lake Games in 2002 - the Avs regressed after the break.

In 1998, when Colorado had nine Olympians, the Avalanche was 29-13-16 at the break - and went 10-13-1 the rest of the way and lost in the first round of the playoffs to Edmonton.

In 2002, when the Avalanche had eight Olympians, Colorado was 33-20-6-1 at the shutdown, and went only a slightly worse 12-8-2-0 down the stretch before losing to Detroit in the conference finals.

 

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Aebischer turns his attention to Avs

After several days on the world stage, David Aebischer was back in his little locker room cubicle Sunday.

The Swiss have been on the map when it comes to chocolate and cheese, but hockey is now more of a brand name thanks to the Avalanche goalie.

His work for Switzerland in Turin helped the country make the quarterfinals, a run that included a victory over Canada. Aebischer took some good-natured kidding from some of the Avs' Canadian players after practice, his first since before the Olympics.

Aebischer had a great time, but he returned with regret he didn't get a chance to take Switzerland further. Despite a 2-0 record and other sterling statistics, Aebischer was on the bench in favor of Martin Gerber when the Swiss were eliminated, 6-2, by eventual gold-medal winner Sweden.

"After the Germany game, I thought I was going to play (the quarterfinal game)," Aebischer said. "But it was (coach Ralph Krueger's) decision, and that's it. But overall, it was much more fun this time than (2002). We finished in sixth place, which is good for us, and we beat two good teams (3-2 over the Czech Republic and 2-0 over Canada). But it would have been good to take one further step, at least."

Aebischer and Slovakia's Peter Budaj and Marek Svatos were the only Olympians at Sunday's practice. Joe Sakic and Rob Blake likely will miss today's practice as well, because Team Canada's charter jet did not leave Italy until Sunday. The other Olympians, except for perhaps Antti Laaksonen (Finland), are expected back on the ice today.

Aebischer said it was "weird" when he returned
to Denver on Saturday after his time in Italy and a couple of days at his home in Switzerland following the team's elimination. But a full practice with his teammates had Aebischer adjusted again, and he's eager to get back to winning games for the Avs. Colorado's first chance is Tuesday against Minnesota at the Pepsi Center.
"It's the final stretch, and it's going to be pretty important," Aebischer said. "It's going to be a tough stretch. We've got games against a lot of good teams, teams that are a little above or behind us. We're going to have to turn on the switch right away."

Aebischer was happy to see his backup, Budaj, play well in Turin. A team whose glaring weakness was supposed to be goaltending a couple of months ago suddenly has two netminders who generated a lot of buzz at the Games. Aebischer has been playing well since January. He might be one of the top handful of goalies in the NHL since.

"Things have gone well, but I learned you have to never get comfortable at all, always try to keep getting better," Aebischer said. "That's what I hope to do."