Forsberg Becoming a Force Again

Colorado’s opponents have been given fair warning.

Center Peter Forsberg says he’s “feeling better and better” with each game he plays this season.

One of the NHL’s best all-around players when he’s healthy, Forsberg missed the Avalanche’s first 23 games while recuperating from off-season shoulder surgery. Then, only two games after he returned to the lineup, a minor hip injury sidelined him for two more games.

Forsberg, however, played in his third consecutive game Friday night, when the Avalanche defeated the Mighty Ducks, 2-1, at the Arrowhead Pond. The teams play again Wednesday night in Denver.

“I said when I came back that it was going to take a little while,” Forsberg said. “But there’s no reason why I shouldn’t be back playing the way I was before the surgery.”

Forsberg hurt his shoulder against Dallas in the fourth game of last season’s Western Conference finals. He played the final three games of the series--and, as it turned out, the season--then underwent surgery in late June.

Forsberg, a member of the gold-medal winning Swedish Olympic team in 1994, showed signs of being his old self in his first game back when he collected five points, including two goals, Nov. 27 against Calgary. It was the most points by an Avalanche player in a game this season.

Since then, Forsberg has had only one assist, but Avalanche Coach Bob Hartley thinks it’s only a matter of time before Forsberg regains his old consistency. “He’s real close now,” Hartley said.

And Forsberg at his best is a sight to behold.

He has averaged 28.2 goals in the last four regular seasons, tying his career high with 30 last season while scoring 97 points. He had eight goals and 16 assists in the 1998-99 playoffs.

Not many players approach Forsberg’s success as a two-way player.

“You look at his game, and there’s not a hole in it,” Duck Coach Craig Hartsburg said. “He’s highly skilled, with great speed, and he’s tough as nails. He can do everything.

“Not too many players as skilled as he is play as hard as he does every night. He puts himself in traffic when he has the puck and he puts himself in traffic when he’s playing defense. He doesn’t avoid any part of the game.”

In his sixth season in the NHL, Forsberg is averaging 0.91 assists per game, a pace that ranks him fourth on the all-time list behind Wayne Gretzky (1.32), Mario Lemieux (1.18) and Bobby Orr (0.98).

“He’s such a natural player,” Hartley said. “He makes everything look so easy, but when you’re around him you see how so much of that still comes from hard work.”

Avalanche left wing Dave Reid, a 17-year NHL veteran, had played against Forsberg frequently before signing with Colorado as a free agent before this season.

“It’s nice to be on the same team with him, I can tell you that,” Reid said. “But I enjoyed playing against him because it was always such a challenge. You just try to limit his chances and contain him as much as you can. It’s hard to keep him off the score sheet.

“He can beat you along the boards with his muscle and strength, or he can finesse you and beat you that way. You can’t contain him by pushing him to the outside and leaning on him because he’ll push right past you with his speed and quickness.”

Colorado has several highly regarded young players, and Hartley thinks Forsberg has been a good influence on the so-called “Kid Line” of Chris Drury, Milan Hejduk and Alex Tanguay.

“When you get a chance to watch him every day in practice, you see all the things he can do, and it makes you appreciate even more the player he is,” Drury said. “He’s not one to go out and preach to anyone, but if you need to know something and you ask him, he’s always ready to help. I’ve learned a lot just watching how he handles himself.”