Scott MacDonald
He recorded nearly 26 minutes of ice time and six blocked shots on Tuesday night — both team-high’s. He leads the team in average time on ice through the first three games, as he does with blocked shots, as well. He’s only been on the ice for one goal against this season. He’s got goals in back-to-back games, and two goals on his first two shots on net so far as an Av — the only D-man in the NHL to boast a 100-percent in that category.
Of course, we’re only three games in and there’s really no way he keeps up this pace (…right?). Either way, pretty damn good start. Yes, it’s early, but Devon Toews looks every bit of worth-it, and some.
That trade is paying off in spades for Avs general manager Joe Sakic. And all this for the low price of two second-round draft picks? That’s a cheap deal for a team that has arguably one of the most well-stocked cupboards of top-end prospects anyway. It’s pennies to the wealthy. For Sakic and the Avalanche, the rich keep getting richer it seems, and Sakic’s savviness of continually pulling off these highway-robbery, thief-in-the-night trades is just getting laughable at this point.
On Tuesday night, this was evident once again. Brandon Saad, another savvy offseason addition of Sakic’s, scored his first goal as an Avalanche to open the scoring and give the Avs an early 1-0 lead. Goal No. 2 came from his other offseason acquisition, the aforementioned Devon Toews, who has had plenty of chemistry on the second-unit power play with fellow D-man Sam Girard.
“They got something good going right now,” head coach Jared Bednar said after the game on Tuesday.
“We’re kind of finding something that works right now,” Toews echoed minutes later.
The newcomer D-man has tallied a quarter of the team’s power-play goals so far this season. Toews, in part, has fueled the Avs to the NHL’s top-ranking power-play unit through the first week of the season.
The Girard-Toews duo on the second man-advantage unit has cashed in two games in a row, on eerily similar goals. Behind-the-back pass from Girard to a waiting Toews at the point. One-timer. Money in the bank.
“He’s a great hockey player, very smart. I didn’t know how good of a one-timer he had,” Nathan MacKinnon added following the Avs 3-2 win over the Kings. “Great shot, great guy. He’s been huge for us.”
Huge might be an understatement if Toews can keep up this kind of production, and not just on the stat sheet, but defensively speaking, too. Oh yeah, and with Sakic moving veteran D-man Ian Cole before Tuesday’s game, that opens the gate for Bowen Byram’s much-anticipated arrival on the Avs blueline, which is coming much sooner rather than later. Indeed, exciting times ahead.
But back to Toews.
So far, everyone’s raved about him, from NHL superstar Nathan MacKinnon to his head coach to his D partner.
“I like how he plays,” Makar said recently. “He moves the puck fast and thinks the game smart.”
He’s earned high-praise from two of the NHL’s best and brightest in the game, in Makar and MacKinnon. Those two aren’t easy to impress. Check Avs Twitter on a nightly basis, and it seems the hockey world agrees: Toews could be the difference-maker for this team this season, the one to push an already excellent core of defensemen to the next level.
And on a team that has arguably the NHL’s most exciting, young cast of defensemen, it’s Devon Toews who is stealing the spotlight.