Evan’s NHL Daily: Avalanche Of All-Stars, Button Rips Leafs

All of the participants for the NHL All-Star game were announced on Saturday, and there will be three members of the Colorado Avalanche taking part in the festivities. Two are expected, one is a bit of a surprise. Not only will the Avalanche be well represented in the game itself, but when it comes to the Skills Competition, 16% of the participants will be from Colorado.

In Canada, after the Avalanche came back from down 3-0 to beat the Toronto Maple Leafs, Craig Button ripped into the Leafs, and told it like it is.

All that and more in this Sunday edition of Evan’s Daily.

Colorado Hockey Now

Some thoughts on the rumor that the Avalanche turned down a Cutter Gauthier for Bowen Byram deal.

After going down 3-0, and playing without Valeri Nichushkin, the Avalanche showed some guts and battled back to win 5-3, with Nathan MacKinnon (surprise) leading the way.

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NHL All-Star Game

We already knew Nathan MacKinnon was headed to the NHL All-Star game, but he’ll have some Colorado company. Both Cale Makar and Alexandar Georgiev will be joining him in Toronto in a few weeks. Mikko Rantanen and Nichushkin didn’t get voted in, which means they’ll get a nice week off to rest.

The Avalanche will have two participants in the All-Star game, but they’ll also have two of their best taking part in the Skills Competition.

10 are set. TWO more All-Stars will get to compete to be the best all-around #NHLAllStar Skills competitor!

Who should it be? Vote on https://t.co/74vzGdILYO or on X with #NHLAllStarVote! 🗳️

Presented by @massmutual pic.twitter.com/OuEIC3BitR

— NHL (@NHL) January 13, 2024

So if you love the NHL All-Star weekend, you’ll get your fill of Avalanche players.

Button Rips Into Leafs

Tensions are always high in Toronto, and they’re even higher after their high-paid stars were outplayed by Colorado’s big guns. After their loss to the Avalanche, Craig Button went on TSN and told it like it is.

TSN Director of Scouting @CraigJButton joins @JayOnrait to discuss the Maple Leafs blowing a three-goal lead to lose to the Avalanche. pic.twitter.com/s0qMFteVmK

— JayOnSC (@JayOnSC) January 14, 2024

Is he wrong? Probably not, but the NHL is a strange league. All it takes is a team getting hot in the Spring and they can go on and win the Cup. Could the Leafs do that? Absolutely. Would I bet on it? I don’t think so.

Meanwhile, here’s the Leafs head coach, Sheldon Keefe, gassing up the stars on Colorado.

"When MacKinnon's line gets out there with Makar and Toews … that's not the NHL. That's another league."

Sheldon Keefe with about as high of praise as you can give for the Avs top guns 🎙️ pic.twitter.com/IQw6m07mkT

— B/R Open Ice (@BR_OpenIce) January 14, 2024

No lies detected, and I’ll just reiterate what I’ve said many times – don’t take stars like this for granted. It’s special to be able to watch them on a nightly basis.

National Hockey Now

Something has to give between the Penguins and Erik Karlsson.

What the Islanders and Barry Trotz learned from each other.

How the “rover” Jamie Drysdale changes the Flyers blueline. (+)