‘Nothing We Can’t Handle’ – Tyson Barrie on Old Friend Nathan MacKinnon

OK, so I’m really not trying to do any clickbait here. First off, Tyson Barrie and Nathan MacKinnon are real good friends and right before he said this, Barrie gave MacKinnon some high praise as a player. But, hey, Tyson Barrie did say this yesterday, when asked about Nathan MacKinnon for the upcoming Western Conference finals between the Colorado Avalanche and Edmonton Oilers.

“He’ll be a handful, but nothing we can’t handle,” Barrie told reporters following Oilers practice Saturday.

Here, see for yourself. Fast forward to about the 5:15 mark:

Like I said, not trying to clickbait here. But if the Avs and MacKinnon are looking for any bulletin-board material for the series – like Nazem Kadri did the last series against St. Louis – they might just want to put “Nothing we can’t handle” in big bold letters on the dressing room wall.

Barrie is just trying to sound confident for his team. Nothing wrong with that. But the Avs have used verbal disses to their advantage before. Not only against Craig Berube, but remember the “We’re going to have some fun and we’re going to beat them” comment by Ryan O’Reilly before the first-round series last year.

You gotta use any advantage you can get in the playoffs.

The Oilers, by the way, flew into Denver today, presumably to better acclimate themselves to the altitude. The altitude thing is mostly a myth, as it doesn’t really affect already highly-trained athletes. It actually works to the Avs’ advantage the most when they go on the road at sea level. I’ve done past articles on these, but couldn’t find them.