Avalanche Practice: Nichushkin, Rodrigues Traveling; Manson Skates

Valeri Nichushkin, John Manson, and Pavel Francouz all hit the ice for the first time since leaving the lineup due to injury. A welcome sight for Avalanche fans.

Manson and Francouz on their first laps since getting injured. pic.twitter.com/DLuaVFnpfm

— Evan Rawal (@evanrawal) January 3, 2023

Val Nichushkin snuck onto the ice as well. He’s testing his ankle a little more aggressively than Manson, whose just taking it slow. https://t.co/Ls34JqIzjf

— Evan Rawal (@evanrawal) January 3, 2023

Manson skated for 20 minutes before practice off on his own, testing out his injury (lower body). He mostly did light work, as this is his first day on the ice since leaving.

Francouz didn’t take any shots and did a lot of the same work Manson did, a first step in returning to the lineup.

Nichushkin, however, tested his injury a bit more aggressively than the other two. He worked mostly with Shawn Allard on hard stops and starts, trying to see what he can handle, and then briefly joined the team for practice. Evan Rodrigues did not skate, but Jared Bednar had positive updates on both after practice.

“He’s (Nichushkin) coming on the trip with us,” Bednar said. “As is E-Rod (Rodrigues). No guarantees they will play.”

As for the long term injuries of Gabriel Landeskog and Bowen Byram, Bednar went into more detail on what has been going on with them.

“Landy a while back got reevaluated and got a new gameplan from his return to get back,” the coach explained. “I wouldn’t call it a setback. I think he’s making really good progress. We’re happy with where it’s going, it’s just a new timeline.”

And Byram?

“I would say Byram was not responding to treatment for a while,” Bednar said. “Now he is, so that’s looking better now too. So his timeline to come back basically got doubled. I can’t give you an exact timeline, because I don’t know. But now these things are starting to come together for him. Both guys have been moving in the right direction.”

The Avalanche will hold an optional skate on Wednesday before taking off on a short two game road trip to Canada. They face off against the Vancouver Canucks on Thursday night.