Colorado Avalanche Depth Affected By Injuries

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Prognosis

Mar 25, 2015; Edmonton, Alberta, CAN; Colorado Avalanche forward Joey Hishon (38) skates against the Edmonton Oilers at Rexall Place. Mandatory Credit: Perry Nelson-USA TODAY Sports

As Team USA discovered last year in the Olympics, putting a bunch of stars together does not necessarily make for a winning team. You’ve got to have some stars, but your bread and butter guys are your, well, bread and butter.

Your depth forwards need to grind the opposition down. They need to get the puck positioned well for faceoffs, which the top lines can then take. They can draw penalties and sometimes even get the emotion going with a well-timed hit or fight. And they should score a few goals.

The Avalanche did not have the depth forwards they anticipated this season. Coach Roy wanted to have an energy line and a try out line for a couple youngsters. He wanted players he could count on for two-way and defensive play. He did not have the complement of players he wanted.

As far as Mitchell and McGinn go — those were big losses. The Avs were lucky they were without Mitchell’s transitional skills for only a little while. They were counting on McGinn, though. They were counting on his transitional abilities, his one-timer, his power play skill.

Having key players on the bottom-six and two transitional players lost to injury for significant portions of the season cost the Colorado Avalanche. It cannot be said that their lost season is due to these losses, but… it was a big contributing factor.

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