Rodrigues Skates Again; Avalanche Players Sent Down

Evan Rodrigues is making huge steps to getting healthy. As the team took the day off to rest, Rodrigues and Kurtis MacDermid were seen at Family Sports Center skating. Rodrigues was given a timetable of 2-4 weeks with a lower body injury but has worked his way back to a full contact sweater as of Friday. MacDermid has started skating in a non contact sweater as well. The Colorado Avalanche were able to get some help last night with the return of Artturi Lehkonen, but it was Mikko Rantanen that stole the show with his overtime winning hattrick goal.

Rodrigues has been working with coach Allard over the last week to ramp up the pace of his skating. At one point last week, he even joined the team for their morning skate at Ball Arena for a brief time. The thinking for me is that this is all forward progress and he is not moving in the wrong direction. If and when he does rejoin the lineup that could provide a spark to the second-line that the Avalanche really need at this point in the season.

ROSTER UPDATE:

We have reassigned Ben Meyers and Andreas Englund to the @ColoradoEagles. #GoAvsGo pic.twitter.com/ZtLCgM37EC

— Colorado Avalanche (@Avalanche) December 12, 2022

There have been some corresponding moves by the Avalanche and Eagles that make me suspect that either Darren Helm or Evan Rodrigues will be healthy soon. Ben Meyers and Andreas Englund were sent down to the Eagles following the win in St. Louis. This is where I think at least a forward is getting healthy, the Eagles sent Cameron Wright to the Utah Grizzlies. To me that shows that room is being made to have players stay in Loveland.

🚨Roster Alert🚨

We have reassigned forward Cameron Wright to the @UtahGrizzlies. #EaglesCountry pic.twitter.com/JGoudGR1kB

— Colorado Eagles (@ColoradoEagles) December 12, 2022