Saturday: Avs In Dallas, NCAA Finals and More

Good morning all. The Avalanche’s quest for 50 points rolls on in Big D tonight, they need 3 points this weekend to hit the mark. The University of Denver plays Minnesota-Duluth for the Championship concurrent with the Avs game and our QMJHL prospects are both in action as well.

Avs

The Avs and Stars are at the top of everyone’s “most disappointing” list but that won’t mean boring hockey tonight. Two teams that struggle with defense and goaltending should make for plenty of fun on the ice. Colorado enters the final weekend of the season with 22 wins, 47 points and a -110 goal diff. Some bullshit marks to shoot for: 10 road wins (they have 9), 50 points and maintaining their perfect 2.00 goals per game average.

It sounds lame, and it should, but there’s a chance for a few guys to hit the 20 goal mark with productive games. Dutch is at 18, Landy at 17 and Mack at 16. If Barrie has a monster time (4+ pts) he could become the 3rd player with 40 points. Grimaldi, Lindholm and Siemens don’t have goals and Lindy/Duncan don’t even have a point, would be cool if those guys got on the board. Tyson Jost is also looking for his 1st assist, I think he’s got a few in him.

Mikko is on the trip but in all likelihood is done for the year. The callups from the Rampage have all done well (like we suspected) and should stick in the lineup. Game time is 8pm ET, 6pm at home.

Rampage

The beloved Rampage broke a 7-game losing streak last night with GM Joe Sakic looking on. Eric Gelinas has finally figured out how to get his shot on net (EV has put him in the Iggy spot now) and had a couple of PP goals. Reid Petryk and Brendan Ranford rounded out the scoring. They get a rematch with Bakersfield tomorrow afternoon.

NCAA Championships

Will Butcher won the coveted Hobey Baker Award yesterday as the NCAA’s best hockey player. Conrgats to him, it’s rarely given to defensemen. He and the Pios play UMD for all the cookies tonight at 8pm ET on ESPN. Since John Buccigross and Barry Melrose will be handling the commentary it’s understandable if one wishes to watch the game on mute or skip it altogether.

DU beat Notre Dame on Thursday to clinch a berth in the finals, Avs prospect Cam Morrison scored ND’s lone goal so that’s a win for us all around. Morrison’s kind of flown under the radar as far as Avs prospects go but he’s had a tremendous freshman year and ended up with 3 goals and an assist in the NCAA tournament. The kid’s got some game.

QMJHL

Nic Meloche’s Charlottetown Islanders opened up their 2nd round series with a win against Cape Breton on Thursday. Meloche had an assist on an ENG at the end but played some excellent defense all night. The Isles play again tonight at 6:30 ET.

J-C Beaudin had 2 wicked goals to go along with a faceoff win that turned into an assist last night as Rouyn-Noranda beat Chicoutimi in game 1 of their 2nd round series. Beaudin is averaging 6 shots per game in the playoffs and is tied for the league lead in points with 11 (4G/7A). On top of his offensive explosion in game 1, he was tasked with shutting down the dangerous Nicolas Roy all night, and did a fine job at that. The Huskies and Sags play again tonight at 7pm ET.

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Watch for the game thread later and have a squishy day!