Sat vs Devils, Mon vs Oilers
Brandon Yip joins Team Ninja as its most recent rookie addition. (Photo by David Barud)
There’s something extraordinary about this Avalanche hockey team that causes them to win games that they have no business winning.
Example A1 – last night’s game at Calgary.
The Flames put 46 shots on goal, and Craig Anderson stopped all but two of them. That’s beyond incredible… that’s straight ninja. Our defense didn’t even play that badly; this was simply a case of Calgary being determined not to lose another game to Colorado… and the Avalanche winning anyway.
You could tell in the third period (as the Flames desperately heaved shots on net and flew around the ice a team possessed) that this inability to manufacture a W against the Avs is really starting to get to them.
I predicted a win, but only because the Avs refuse to lose versus the Flames this season. They have four wins in four tries against (in my mind) the best team in the Northwest Division. Calgary is built for a Championship: puck-possession hockey, four solid lines, a trio of big-time goal-scorers, a shut-down defense, and a lightning-quick goaltender. So how do the Avalanche continue to stymie the Flames?
There is no simple answer, and a little bit of luck is certainly in play here. But what really frustrates a big, strong hockey team like the Flames – and don’t discount frustration playing its part in Calgary’s inability to score on the Avs late in games – is that Colorado has the most incredible team speed in the league. Aside from Adam Foote (no disrespect to Footer, he deserves his C) this team is flat-out the fastest in the NHL.
And yet their greatest strength is also the reason that the Avalanche lose to hard-working, light-on-talent teams like the Islanders and Hurricanes.
The Avs only have 1st gear and 5th gear, and you simply can’t play in 5th gear all the time. Colorado can beat any team in the league on unfriendly ice, and lose their next game at home to a bunch of muckers. Such is the way of the hockey ninja… apparently.
The most ninjtastic of them all is Craig Anderson.
I know I’ve been gushing about Craig since the Colorado front office went out and grabbed him in the offseason, but I can’t help it. He’s some crazy hybrid of Patrick Roy & Dominik Hasek… and I love to watch him play.
Sat, Jan 16th vs New Jersey Devils (1:00 MST)
PREDICTION:Â AVALANCHE 4, DEVILS 3 (OT)
Mon, Jan 18th vs Edmonton Oilers (7:00 MST)
PREDICTION:Â AVALANCHE 2, OILERS 4
WEEK 16 PREDICTION: Â 1-1
**Bonus Coverage**
Yip-pie!
Brandon Yip played his first game for the Avalanche less than a month ago, and he has already become an offensive stalwart. The rapid blooming of Brandon has been another in a series of pleasant surprises coming up from the Colorado farm system this season. Apparently, Joe Sacco had a whole team of NHL-ready forwards down in Lake Erie, and he’s been calling them up ever since his arrival in Denver at the beginning of the offseason.
Yip is a big guy with work ethic; the perfect compliment to the Avalanche’s team speed and ninjutsu-esque abilities.  He scored his first goal with his only shot in his second game, and followed that up four games later by scoring two goals on two shots at Detroit. For you math-happy readers, that’s 100% of shots scored in two of his first five games in the NHL.
At 24, Yip is one of the old men of the stacked Avalanche rookie class. His ice time and shot totals have been consistent over the last few games. That bodes well for an Avalanche squad that depends on scoring from both the heights and the depths of its bench.
Welcome to Team Ninja, Mr. Yip.
