Avs Raise Compete Level at Practice

With little practice time remaining before the season resumes to the most competitive hockey of the year, the Colorado Avalanche is continuing to add more intensity to its ice sessions to be as ready as possible for when the puck drops in the 2020 postseason.
To help enhance the compete level throughout its Phase 3 training camp, the Avalanche coaching staff is looking to its veteran players to help, including Hart Memorial Trophy and Ted Lindsay Award finalist Nathan MacKinnon.
"I think [increasing the intensity is] what we're looking for from our leaders, and I think Nate does a real good job with that. Getting in 5-on-5 drills that are sort of scrimmage based or game situational stuff where we have to try and create offense or defend, especially in zone play, I want to see that intensity up because it's hard just to flip the switch to go from scrimmage mode and summer mode straight into very meaningful games," said head coach Jared Bednar. "The intensity levels going to get up in a hurry and the more prepared we are for that, the better off we're going to be. I'm relying on our leaders to continually kind of dial this thing up until we play our first game, that exhibition game, and that goes for special teams as well.

"We know that goaltending is going to be a real big key going into the playoffs as it always is, and special teams always are a big factor in success or failure. So, you know, we have a hunger to score on our power play, we know that we want it to improve from the area it was in the regular season and Nate is doing a really good job kind of driving that intensity and the game situational stuff here. Not just in practices but into the scrimmages too and putting a high demand on our guys to want to try and score every single opportunity we get."

After competing in intrasquad scrimmages in three of their last four practices, the Avs split Wednesday's session in half, focusing on 5-on-5 drills for the first 30 minutes and placing an emphasis on special teams in the final half hour of training.
During the 2019-20 campaign, the Avalanche went on the man-advantage 241 times, the most in the league, and scored 46 times, tied for the eighth most. However, Colorado will look to improve on its 19.1-percent success rate on the power play when the NHL's second season begins in August. Additionally, the team is ranked tied for 13th with an 81.4 percent frequency in killing penalties.
The first power-play unit at Wednesday's practice comprised of forwards Andre Burakovsky, Gabriel Landeskog, MacKinnon and Mikko Rantanen and D-man Samuel Girard. The second group featured Joonas Donskoi, Nazem Kadri, Valeri Nichushkin and Erik Johnson, while Vladislav Namestnikov and J.T. Compher alternated reps in the drills.
The first group of players spent some time talking through drills with the rest of the power-play unit after the team session ended, the second practice day in a row that the unit has gotten together to work on some extra maneuvers.

"I think everybody on that power-play group or everybody who I play with, I like to talk about plays, Nate loves to talk about plays and Landy likes to talk about plays," Rantanen said of the power-play group chat. "We like to do that. I think you need to do it before special teams or even 5-on-5, you have to go through things, it doesn't always just roll through. You can't be silent on the bench and expect to play well and know what the other guys want to do, that's why you have to have that communication. Nate is obviously a good leader and the way he demands that from us a lot, and I think I learned that from him. He demands the best every day, we won't be able to do it every day, obviously there are bad days and stuff like that, but the way he demands I think I learn from him a lot that you have to be on top of your game every day."
MacKinnon, who finished fourth in the NHL with 31 man-advantage points during the regular season, has been vocal on the ice since camp opened on July 13 to help the team take the necessary steps toward the ultimate goal of winning a championship.
"It's good we get to train at altitude, which is kind of an advantage I think when we are going to sea level in a few days here… Feeling good, was skating hard even before camp in quarantine, I have a gym at my house back home so I was working out for a couple months, I think everyone was, everyone looks great," said MacKinnon, an alternate captain on the squad. "No one uses camp to get into shape, the way we looked at this was once [camp started], everyone just kind of buzzed from there. From the drop of the puck from the first drill, we want it to be high intensity but also light and fun, we're not getting ready for an 82-game season here. It's going to be quick, hopefully we are there for two months or whatever it is, and we come home with a trophy."

Prospect forwards Sheldon Dries and Logan O'Connor joined the group to take penalty killing reps and then came back out for the second session that involved only prospects, which included forwards Shane Bowers, Vladislav Kamenev and T.J. Tynan; defensemen Bowen Byram, Anton Lindholm and Jacob MacDonald; and goaltenders Michael Hutchinson and Adam Werner.

WHAT'S NEXT

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With only a few days remaining in the Mile High City before heading north of the border, the Avs are expected to have another intrasquad scrimmage at Pepsi Center on Thursday.
The Avalanche will travel to the Western Conference hub city of Edmonton, Alberta, on Sunday before taking on the Minnesota Wild in an exhibition game at 12:30 p.m. MT on Wednesday. Colorado opens its Stanley Cup Qualifier schedule against the St. Louis Blues on Aug. 2.

GROUP 1 PRACTICE COMBINATIONS

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Andre Burakovsky - Nathan MacKinnon - Mikko Rantanen
Gabriel Landeskog - Nazem Kadri - Valeri Nichushkin
Tyson Jost - Vladislav Namesnikov - J.T. Compher - Joonas Donskoi
Matt Nieto - Pierre-Edouard Bellemare - Matt Calvert
Samuel Girard - Erik Johnson
Ryan Graves - Ian Cole
Nikita Zadorov - Kevin Connauton
Mark Barberio - Conor Timmins
Philipp Grubauer & Pavel Francouz