When Phil Kessel played in an NHL record 1,064 games in a row, he began his streak just over 200 games into his career at the young age of 22. Keith Yandle, who appeared in 989 games in a row leading up to his 2022 retirement, also began his run at 22 years old, and just over 100 games into his NHL career.<\/p>\n
Avalanche defenseman Brent Burns is set to dress in his 1,000th consecutive game when the Avalanche face the Dallas Stars early Saturday afternoon. More impressively, the now 41-year-old began his streak when he was 28. <\/p>\n
He was already a whopping 572 games into his NHL career.<\/p>\n
\u201cA lot of careers end before 600 games, and then you\u2019re playing a thousand straight after that,\u201d head coach Jared Bednar said on Friday. \u201cIt\u2019s mind-blowing, really, to me.\u201d<\/p>\n
Burns began his run in November of 2013 \u2014 a month into Nathan MacKinnon\u2019s rookie season in the NHL. In these last 13 years, he\u2019s developed a reputation of being one of the strongest, most driven players on the ice, in the weight room, and during practice. But there was a lot of luck involved, too.<\/p>\n
Burns recalled several instances that could\u2019ve ended his streak since that night in San Jose when he and the rest of his Sharks teammate defeated the Tampa Bay Lightning, in Jon Cooper\u2019s rookie season, 5-1.<\/p>\n
For example, in December 2021, Burns was diagnosed with COVID-19 and was set to miss the next San Jose game. Twenty-four hours later, the entire league shut down for almost three weeks, which allowed his streak to continue when games resumed after the new year.<\/p>\n
Or the time in the early years when he sustained an injury in the final game before the break. He was able to recover before games resumed several days later.<\/p>\n
There were also times when he was severely sick, only to find out that his team at the time would suddenly have two, or sometimes three days off between games, giving him ample time to recover.<\/p>\n
It takes luck to get through these runs. Burns would never say otherwise.<\/p>\n
\u201cYou got pucks flying around your head, you see skates popping up, guys falling onto the ice,\u201d Burns said, describing the many things that happen during a game that could take a player out. \u201cOr you look at your visor after a game, it\u2019s all marked up. Like, it\u2019s a tough game. Every game is hard. So a lot of luck. That\u2019s probably why I hate talking about it.\u201d<\/p>\n
The luck also comes in ways that are out of a player\u2019s control. Take Nazem Kadri as an example. When Kadri began his tenure with the Calgary Flames in 2022-23, he played in every single game with them, leading up to his trade back to Colorado on March 6. That\u2019s 82 games in each of his three full seasons with the Flames, followed by 61 games before the deadline. <\/p>\n
That\u2019s 307 consecutive games for Kadri, which was a personal best.<\/p>\n
But then he was traded to the Avs just after 1 p.m. MT on deadline day. He was in Calgary when the trade happened. Four hours later, his new team, the Avalanche, dropped the puck in Dallas. Kadri was listed as a healthy scratch, effectively ending his run.<\/p>\n
\u201cIn the record books, it might say he missed a game. But to us, he was available,\u201d Burns said of Kadri, realizing how easy it is for these runs to end. \u201cHe even played in that early game two days later against Minnesota and had a big play. But this is just another way that I was lucky for all these years.\u201d<\/p>\n
Burns began the run with the San Jose Sharks. He signed an eight-year contract extension with the club, which ended with three seasons in Carolina. When that deal expired, Burns chose to sign with the Avs with hopes of making an extended playoff run, one that could end with a Stanley Cup championship.<\/p>\n
Since his streak began, Burns hasn\u2019t missed a single playoff game either. His team has played 108 postseason games, and he\u2019s dressed in every single one, which is among the top 20 in the league since 2014. For comparison, MacKinnon has dressed in 95 games.<\/p>\n
The longevity of his career is something to marvel at. Burns is the last remaining player still in the NHL that also played before the 2004-05 lockout.<\/p>\n
Saturday will be Game No. 1,572 in his career, of which the last 1,000 have been played consecutively. It puts him just 64 back of Kessel\u2019s record, something that, he admitted, would be cool to hit. But it\u2019s not something he can commit to either way. <\/p>\n
\u201cTruthfully, I really try not to look too far ahead,\u201d Burns said. \u201cI barely know the schedule for the next day, as some of these guys would know.\u201d<\/p>\n
Burns has 11 goals and 31 points for the Avalanche, with a career-best +30 rating to go along with it. The 18:52 he averages per game is the first year he\u2019s played fewer than 20 minutes per night since that 2013-14 season that began this whole thing. <\/p>\n
The goal he scored against Pittsburgh on March 16 secured his 14th of 22 seasons with double-digit goals. Five of Burns\u2019 goals this season are game winners for the Avalanche. In the past six seasons combined before this, he played in 454 games and had just four game winners.<\/p>\n
His teammates love him, respect him, and when that matchup against the Stars concludes, they\u2019ll have another opportunity to celebrate the veteran leader.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"When Phil Kessel played in an NHL record 1,064 games in a row, he began his streak just…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":540392,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[5116],"tags":[193,1772,192,144,5277,5,4],"class_list":{"0":"post-540391","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-colorado-avalanche","8":"tag-avalanche","9":"tag-brent-burns","10":"tag-colorado","11":"tag-colorado-avalanche","12":"tag-coloradoavalanche","13":"tag-hockey","14":"tag-nhl"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/channels.im\/@nhl\/116347003659036943","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/540391","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=540391"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/540391\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/540392"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=540391"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=540391"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=540391"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}