After last night's colossal pooping of hockey pants, a collective 'gulp' was heard round the Avalanche post season success party. Now, one game isn't enough to sway the brains here at MHH, but it is enough to make us kill kittens and have nightmares of that "game" replaying in our minds all last night.

So, what that tumultuous night's non-sleep resulted in is the following two part question in my head: First: Who do you, the adoring fans, PREDICT the AVS will face in the playoffs if they hold on and make it? And second: who would you WANT them to face?

We'll also take a look at the AVS record against potential playoffs match ups, as well as their final 16 "must win" games left on the schedule.  A new "Mission 16 W" is upon us.

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Two weeks? Really?

Well this gives us (mandatory) time to pause and reflect upon some of the infinitesimal and obscure aspects of the season to this point. I'm taking the NHL standstill opportunity to dissect the standings without them changing by the time I finish writing this article.

The West

The bummer about Saturday's lame shutout against the Kings is that the AVS would be sitting in third place right now had they won -- or at least got to OT. I've been talking about how Andy should rest and Budaj get some action, but honestly I'm glad Budaj didn't play that game because then naysayers would have blamed that miserable showing on Boods rather than the listless team in front of him. Soapbox complete.

Regardless of Saturday's unsatisfactory SoCal performance, the AVS actually sit in a decent spot as the standings freeze for the next two weeks. They've opened a 5 point lead on the team below them, and sit neck and neck with LA, Vancouver and Phoenix for their playoff spot. The Northwest is up for grabs and I hope that despite their youth, the AVS can muster some inspired play and seize control over the NW lead - especially with Vancouver continuing their crazy road trip even after the Olympics for six more games. 

The East

The push for the playoffs will be hotly contested as usual, but it is shaping up quite differently in the two conferences. If the Western conference teams took their records over to the East, FIVE Western teams that currently sit OUT of the playoffs would have enough points to be IN the playoffs out East. That tells us that the Western conference has been beating up on the Eastern Conference this year. The overall record for the West against the East is killer 127-72-22. The East's record vs the West is an Arnasonish (add it to the glossary) 101-111-27. 

In fact, discounting OT, only 3 teams from the West have losing records against the East (Dallas, Edmonton and the Blues), as opposed to the 8 teams with losing records vs the West from the East (NJ, Philly, Boston, Montreal, Leafs, Panthers, Hurricanes, and Rangers). The AVS are 11-5-1 vs the East.

In the West, 5 teams sit 5 or less points out of the playoffs. It's wide open. In the East it's a little more comfortable as only 3 teams are that close to the post season, and it doesn't look like it will get much more crowded. Carolina is once again making a big push, but they lost so much ground earlier in the season with Cam Ward being injured that they're still a long ways off. Both the Islanders and Panthers don't appear to be serious contenders either. And the Maple Leafs, well at least they'll get a high draft pick, oh, wait......bummer. Whereas in the West, all but two teams (Oil & BJ's) are still serious contenders. So long as the Wings miss the playoffs and the AVS make it, the 2010 season will be a qualified success.

My unqualified playoff predictions after the jump.

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Our long-meandering series continues today with a look at players who've worn #5 for the Avalanche. The three players who've worn it - Alexei Gusarov, Todd Gill and Brett Clark - have appeared in 694 games for the Avalanche, 2nd most so far. Strangely, they only managed 59 playoff games, 4th worst out of the 5 numbers we've done so far.

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Our sizzling sweater series resumes today with a look at...you guessed it: #4. Of the numbers we've done so far, quatro has been worn by the most number of players (5), the most number of games (861). Three of the five players who've worn it have their names on the Cup for the Avs (although one was technically a #44 at the time). It's a number with an interesting history for sure. Once again, it's a number worn mostly be defensemen (mostly) and, indeed, all 5 Avs who've worn it have been d-men.

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I thought this was going to be an easy little series, but it turns out the research makes this a little slower going. I was figuring I could bang out a couple a day until the start of the season, but that doesn't seem like it's going to happen. This is still keeping me entertained, however, and so it continues.

3 is, according to De La Soul, the magic number. Like #2, it's a number traditionally worn by defensemen. Indeed, the 4 Avalanche players who've worn it have all been defensemen (we've got a couple more entries before we get to the first forward). I have to estimate the totals a little bit (see Pascal Trepanier below), but it looks like #3 has been worn in about 592 regular season games and 82 postseason games for a total of 674 games.

1996-2000: Aaron Miller. Miller played 361 games (301 regular season / 60 postseason) for the Avs - tops for this number - and yet it's surprisingly tough to find photos of him. It appears that Miller wore #3 for UVM as well as for the Cornwall Aces (speaking of aces, that logo is, in spades). As we recently learned, #3 was retired by the Nordiques for J.C. Tremblay so when Miller got some limited duty with the Nords in '93-'94 and '94-'95 he wore #44 and #31. It appears that he kept #31 when he played 5 games in Denver after the move (again, photo evidence is sadly evading me). Beginning in 1996, Miller moved from a part-timer to a regular and changed to his preferred #3. He kept that in LA after being moved in the Rob Blake deal but had to move to #4 when he went to Vancouver because #3 was taken by Kevin Bieksa.

Miller's #3 Totals: 361 GP 20G 51A 71P +55 207 PiM

2001-2002: Pascal Trepanier: Finding pictures of Aaron Miller was tough. Finding a photo of Pascal Trepanier in an Avalanche jersey was nearly impossible. I'm not even sure if Trepanier is wearing #11 above. Trepanier has worn 3 different numbers with the Avs; I don't know if that's the most, but it has to be close. He wore #7 in '97-'98 and then switched to #27 when he was claimed in the waiver draft by the Ducks. When he returned to the Avs in 2001, #27 was in use by Scott Parker. You think Trepanier thought about asking Parker to change numbers? I don't either. Trepanier went with #11. However, he changed to #3 later in the season after Darius Kasparitis was aquired. Trepanier played in 74 games that year. I don't know how many were played with each number, but Kasparaitis played in 11 games, so I'll assume that same number for Trepanier wearing #3, plus the 2 postseason games that he appeared in. Trepanier wore #27 in Nashville (for all of one game) and overseas he's worn #3 and #7 that I could find and hockeydb lists him as having worn #7, #11 and #18 at various points in his AHL career.

Pascal Trepanier's #3 Totals: Unknown, assuming 13 GP

2003-2008: Karlis Skrastins: Finally, something that's a little easier to google. Skrastins began his North American career wearing #40 for the Norfolk Admirals. He wore that same number for two games with the Predators but then switched to his familiar #3. He's worn that number ever since, with both the Avalanche and the Florida Panthers. Now that he's with the Dallas Stars, he'll have to change, as Stephane Robidas owns #3. He's already listed on their roster page as wearing #37 - which would apparently be a combination of his NHL #3 and the #7 he wears internationally. In all, Skrastins appeared in 275 regular season games and 20 postseason games for the Avalanche. Of course, along the way he broke Tim Horton's iron man streak for defensemen; interestingly, while Horton was most known for wearing #7 with the Maple Leafs, he also wore #3 for a season or so with the New York Rangers.

Karlis Skrastins #3 Totals: 295 GP 9G 36A 45P +4 153 PiM

2008-2009: Lawrence Nycholat. I had been unable to find any photos of Nycholat from his 5-game stint with the Avalanche this spring, but Googlemaster Aph was able to help me out. The journeyman defenseman has worn 28, 3, 2, 3, 32 and 3 for the Rangers, Capitals, Senators, Senators, Canucks and Avalanche. I know he's worn 28 and 37 at various points in the AHL and IHL, 25 in the ECHL and 5 in the WHL. A couple more years and he might have them all covered. It looks like he's been assigned 32 again in Vancouver.

Nycholat's #3 Totals: 5GP 0G 0A 0P -2 0 PiM

Totals (estimated due to Trepanier): 674GP 29G 87A 116P +56 360 PiM

Our series resumes with a look at...#2. As with before, I'm using AvalancheDB, hockeyreference, hockeydb and something called a google to guide me. The deuce has been worn by 3 Avs over the years and has appeared in 446 regular season games and 89 playoff games for a total of 535 games. In the same way that #1 is a number traditionally worn by goalies, #2 is a number generally worn by defensemen. Sure enough, all three who've worn it for Colorado are blueliners.

1995-1999: Sylvain Lefebvre. The player who wore #2 the most is new Assistant Coach Sylvain Lefebvre. He's also, as you can see above, the only other Avalanche to have worn the captain's C. Lefebvre made the move from Quebec with the franchise, bringing his #2 with him. He played for 4 years in Colorado, playing in 303 regular season games, 65 postseason games and winning 1 totally rad baptismal font. Lefebvre first wore #3 with the Canadiens (#2 is retired for Doug Harvey), but switched to #2 when he was traded to the Maple Leafs in 1992. He probably would have kept it for the rest of his career, but when he left Colorado for New York in 1999, some Brian Leetch guy was wearing it. He switched to #24.

2000-2003: Bryan Muir. Bryan Muir played in 62 regular season games and, surprisingly, 24 playoff games with the Avalanche (including 3 games during the 2001 Cup run). As a journeyman, Muir has been all over the place numerically - 35, 34, 45, 37, 6, 2, 47...and that doesn't include numbers for his AHL and European teams. But for the Avalanche he wore the relatively sane #2.

2006-2007: Ken Klee. Klee was only with the Avalanche for one solid season, amassing 81 games in an Avalanche pre-unipron jersey. Like Lefebvre, Klee seems to heavily favor #2 - he wore the deuce for years as a Washington Capital (seen here headed to hug another guy you might know). When Klee signed with in 2003, #2 was taken by Wade Belak so Klee had to do the doubling thing, going to #22. I wonder if he was a little miffed later that year when Belak gave up his number when the Leafs acquired Brian Leetch (that guy again!)? At the deadline in 2006, Klee was traded to the New Jersey Devils; #2 was in use (by either Dan McGillis, David Hale or Vladimir Malakhov...I can't tell who) and Klee was saddled with #8. Perhaps wearing such a different number was why Klee managed just 1 point in 24 games with the Devils (at least the 1 point came in the playoffs). After that, it's been all twos for KK - 2 for the Avs, 22 for the Thrashers (Garnet Exelby had #2) and then 2 with the Ducks and Coyotes.

In an effort to fill the remaining 58 days before the season starts, I thought it might be fun to take a look at the different jersey numbers worn by the Avs over the years. I've always been fascinated by jersey numbers, and this exercise will probably be more whimsical than serious study.

According to the tremendous resource at AvalancheDB, 65 different numbers have been worn by the Avalanche, from #1 (see below) to the #97 worn by Per Ledin last season. We'll talk a bit about the most (and least popular) numbers as we go. For now, I'd like to jump right into...

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