Darren Helm’s reintegration to the Avalanche lineup will be handled with caution, but his increase in minutes and intensity won’t be gradual. In fact, it only took two periods to end up embroiled in a controversial penalty involving Sidney Crosby that left Helm and the Avs fuming.
Helm’s victory lap season hasn’t gone as planned. Colorado’s 5-2 loss to the Penguins on Wednesday was just his sixth game, and his second return from a long-term injury. The 36-year-old signed a one-year contract with the Avalanche after winning the 2022 Stanley Cup, spent the first half of the title defense rehabbing from a lower-body injury, returned for five games, suffered a related injury, then missed another two months.
“When it comes to groin, abdomen, all that, everything’s connected,” Avalanche coach Jared Bednar said. After the second injury Jan. 12 in Chicago, there was organizational concern that Helm might be done for the year — an unceremonious potential ending considering he could have retired with a ring last June, if he had wanted to walk away.
“Right after Chicago, I was pretty upset about that,” Helm said. “But the next day, just right back at it. Wanted to get back.”
Once he started rehabbing to see how he felt, “I felt pretty positive right away that I was going to get back,” Helm said. “But there was nothing quick about it.”
The team will be monitoring his physical progress with extra scrutiny this time to ensure he’s back for good. “Conversations with him will be on a daily basis just to see how he comes out of games, how he’s feeling tonight after the game,” Bednar said. “Does that change in the morning? Can we manage it by taking some practice days off? Could he miss games? Sure. We’ll just sort of play it by ear.”
If Helm is healthy, he adds a vital extra dimension to Colorado’s options in the middle of the ice. General manager Chris MacFarland navigated the trade deadline with the understanding that this return wasn’t a guarantee, acquiring depth center Lars Eller to fill out the lineup.
Helm can play center or wing. Last year in the playoffs, he played fourth-line center. That’s where he found himself again Wednesday in his return. If he and Eller are Colorado’s bottom-six centers, it creates the flexibility for Alex Newhook to play wing. He moved up to the second line vs. Pittsburgh to compensate for injuries.
“We kind of converted (Helm) over to a center later in the year last year because we had a need,” Bednar said. “… He had played center earlier in his career, but it had been a while. And then he went to work on his faceoff for a number of months before we put him into that position.”
Which led to Helm’s time and place on the ice vs. Pittsburgh. Overlapping with the Penguins’ top line, he and the future Hall of Famer Crosby got into it behind the Avalanche net. Whistles blew, to Helm’s bewilderment. He and Crosby received matching minors for roughing — but Helm had an extra two minutes tacked on for a holding penalty.
Bednar, who was shown on the TNT national broadcast spitting choice words at the officials, was close to as angry as he has been about any call this season. He thought the penalties should have been a wash, “or called nothing. Nothing at all. It’s two strong, veteran players battling. … It didn’t make sense to me. I asked for an explanation. Got a little bit different explanation the second time around. It still doesn’t make sense to me. I’ve watched it over and over.
“The first explanation I got, he couldn’t really give me a story on why we were short, except we were short.”
Bednar watched the replay at intermission, reconvened with the officials and asked again. He said the explanation was different the second time, adding to the frustration. As for Helm?
“Yeah, I was surprised,” he said. “I thought we were just kind of battling hard, and yeah, I don’t know. I thought it was just a hard hockey play.”
Hard hockey plays from Helm are an encouraging sign for the Avalanche, at least.
