It was just like old times inside the Avalanche's Pepsi Center locker room Monday morning, where several members of the 20th anniversary team gathered for interviews and to talk about the good ol' days.
Along with former team president and general manager Pierre Lacroix, they'll take part in a ceremony Monday night before the Avalanche and Minnesota Wild meet for the second time in three days.
Here are the game notes.
The Avalanche will use the same lineup they did in Saturday's 3-0 loss in Minnesota with one exception: Andreas Martinsen will replace Mikhail Grigorenko. Zach Redmond will be scratched for the third game in a row.
Coach Patrick Roy, one of Monday night's honorees, will start Semyon Varlamov in goal against the Wild and Reto Berra on Wednesday against Pittsburgh.
***** As for the 20th anniversary team members, I got to chat a bit with Lacroix, Ray Bourque, Matt Duchene, Peter Forsberg and general manager Joe Sakic. Valeri Kamensky, Sandis Ozolinsh and Stephane Yelle also attended the morning skate.
Bourque, who raised the Avalanche's second Stanley Cup in 2001, said "about a dozen players" had dinner Sunday night "telling a lot of stories and just looking back on playing with each other. It's always great to come back and have some nice flashbacks of some great things that happened in the 15 months I spent here."
Bourque said he missed about 20 minutes of the locker room celebration after the Avalanche won Game 7 against New Jersey because he was taken to the media room immediately after the game.
"That I’d like to have back," he said. "After that, the celebration continued until about 3 a.m. that night. For me it probably went to about 5 in the morning because Pierre told me to go home with the Cup. I brought it home and I had a whole bunch of family with me. I had a big cooler in the van and people came out of their houses at 3 in the morning to celebrate with me until 5 a.m. on my street in Littleton. That was a special night.
"It’s fun to be part of the history of the Avalanche. Every year it seems like they were going for it, making a big trade. Pierre’s that type of guy and at that point in 2000 when I was looking to go somewhere to compete for a championship, when I ended up here I was very pleased, very happy. I lived an incredible 15 months here."
Lacroix, the architect of the Avalanche's two championship teams, lives in Las Vegas with his wife and hasn't seen many of his former players since the 15th anniversary reunion.
"This is fantastic," he said. "It's also fantastic to see that everyone is doing great. People have grown in age and maturity. It's amazing to see how well everyone is doing. It's a great moment for me. I would not have missed this. It's a big family reunion.
"If you go back to '96 with all the young kids, a young team ... now they've all gotten married, they have kids. And to be here and to see you guys, it's refreshing."
Forsberg was forced to retire in February 2011 after a brief comeback attempt because of chronic foot problems. He's now assistant general manager of Modo in the Swedish Elite League in his hometown of Ornskoldsvik.
"For me, it's awesome to come back here," he said. "It's great to see all these guys. Spent a lot of time with (Adam) Deadmarsh. He was my first roommate in Quebec and I roomed with him for another four years here. We hadn't seen each other for a while. But things are really good. Two kids, family, a few businesses back home. My days are full and I really enjoy it. It's all good. I have a real estate endeavor (in Denver), but I sold my place, the apartment I had here.
"A few things have changed. The city has grown a lot. But you come into the dressing room and it kind of looks the same. It brings back a lot of memories. It's a good feeling walking in the building. It's kind of nice not to be playing because I was always so nervous before games, thinking about how I was going to play. It's just nice not to have that feeling. But I do miss the feeling after the games when we won."
Forsberg said he plans to play in the alumni game against Detroit at Coors Field in February.
"I don't know how much ice time they will give me," he said. "I'm going to go home and start skating a little so I'm not that bad in that game. Me and Markus (Naslund) started a charity back home and we have a couple of games a year and we played a few times. That's the only time I've been on the ice."
Forsberg still follows the Avalanche and the Flyers, for whom he played parts of two seasons.
"I watch NHL on the Fly at 8 o'clock in the morning before I go to work," he said. "The Avs-Flyers (on Nov. 10) was the only game I stayed up at night to watch. If there's an early game on Saturday or Sunday, then I watch. With two kids (3 and 1), they don't understand why I would be up for a 3 1-2 hours late at night."
Sakic doesn't spend much time in the locker room these days, but his old corner locker still has his name on it and remains empty.
"I haven't seen some of these guys in a long, long time," he said. "Players, wives, it was a great opportunity for all of us to get together (Sunday) and reconnect and go over all the old memories. This and the Stadium Series game and the alumni game, everybody's looking forward to that too.
"When you don't see your old teammates and you get together, you feel like you never stepped away. You feel young again. We all felt honored and privileged to play for this organization, to play in this city."
Duchene called it a "huge honor" to be part of the anniversary team.
"You think back to the memories watching these guys, it's definitely a cool experience," he said. "At the start of the year I was kind of secretly hoping to be on it. This is the organization I grew up pretty much worshipping. To be a part of this is really special."
*****
The anniversary team includes 12 forwards, six defensemen and two goalies.
Forwards: Adam Deadmarsh, Chris Drury, Matt Duchene, Peter Forsberg, Milan Hejduk, Valeri Kamensky, Gabriel Landeskog, Claude Lemieux, Joe Sakic, Paul Stastny, Alex Tanguay, Stephane Yelle
Defensemen: Rob Blake, Ray Bourque, Adam Foote, Erik Johnson, John-Michael Liles, Sandis Ozolinsh
Goalies: Patrick Roy, Semyon Varlamov