Avalanche are the healthiest they’ve been all year on eve of the playoffs

The Colorado Avalanche have battled a ridiculous amount of injuries this year.

On the eve of the playoffs, they’re finally at their healthiest.

Outside of captain Gabriel Landeskog, who will unfortunately miss the entire postseason, all of Colorado’s players practiced on Monday in their regular sweaters. With no one in a red “no-contact” jersey, this means head coach Jared Bednar will have all options available to him for Game 1 of Round 1 against the Kraken on Tuesday night.

No red sweaters!! Wild!!! Healthiest team has been all year. pic.twitter.com/ljuTHG8NBC

— Darren McKee (@DMacRadio) April 17, 2023

Avs practice:

Rodrigues-MacKinnon-Rantanen
Lehkonen-Compher-Nichushkin
Newhook-Eller-Malgin
O’Connor-Cogliano-Nieto-Meyers-Helm (all in 4L colors)

Makar, Toews, Manson, Girard, Byram, Johnson, Johnson, Hunt, MacDermid

Georgiev
Francouz

As healthy as they’ve been all year.

— Peter Baugh (@Peter_Baugh) April 17, 2023

Getting back Cale Makar and Josh Mason on defense is obviously huge. Andrew Cogliano and Denis Malgin dodging injuries after scares against Winnipeg is big. And Darren Helm will be available, should Bednar want to use him.

But the man in charge has some tough decisions to make. Out of all those names listed in the tweet above, he’ll have to scratch five of them. Ben Meyers, Kurtis MacDermid and Brad Hunt will almost certainly not play. The other two choices will be tougher. The odd men out could be Matt Nieto and Jack Johnson, but we’ll have to see how it shakes out.

Regardless, this is a good “problem” to have. The Avs have put together so many crazy lineups this year, it’ll be nice to see them with (nearly) everyone available.

The journey to repeat as champions is about to begin, and the timing of everything coming together from a health perspective could not be better.

(Update 1:35 p.m.) –

Even though Bednar was coy about the status of Makar after practice, Makar himself confirmed he’ll be ready for Game 1.

“Yeah, I’ll be good to go tomorrow night,” Makar said. “Sometimes you can’t catch a break. This year was one of those years. I’ll play an 82-game season at some point I hope.”

Cale update. Says he’s feeling good! pic.twitter.com/x50voWX9un

— Darren McKee (@DMacRadio) April 17, 2023

That’s obviously huge getting the Conn Smythe winner back to start the playoffs, as Makar’s missed 22 games this year. No one will remember that, though, if the Avs go back-to-back and Makar has another monster postseason.

***

Related

Avalanche name new head coach for AHL affiliate EaglesFive most important Avalanche games during the 2026-27 seasonNHL drops schedule for 2026-27 Avalanche seasonFirst Avalanche game of 2026-27 season announced, it’s in SeptemberAvs make three more depth signings, including forward with 477 NHL gamesAvalanche sign depth defenseman from the Flyers