{"id":551357,"date":"2026-04-12T20:55:01","date_gmt":"2026-04-12T20:55:01","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/551357\/"},"modified":"2026-04-12T20:55:01","modified_gmt":"2026-04-12T20:55:01","slug":"avalanche-coach-takes-puck-to-the-face-will-miss-final-regular-season-games","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/551357\/","title":{"rendered":"Avalanche coach takes puck to the face, will miss final regular-season games"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><a href=\"https:\/\/www.foxnews.com\/category\/sports\/nhl\/colorado-avalanche\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\" data-ylk=\"slk:Colorado Avalanche;elm:context_link;itc:0;sec:content-canvas\" class=\"link rapid-noclick-resp\">Colorado Avalanche<\/a> head coach Jared Bednar will be seeking his second Stanley Cup title with his team, but he will have to take a seat off the ice for the remainder of the regular season.<\/p>\n<p>Bednar was struck in the face with a puck on Saturday night during a 3-2 overtime loss to the <a href=\"https:\/\/www.foxnews.com\/category\/sports\/nhl\/vegas-golden-knights\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\" data-ylk=\"slk:Vegas Golden Knights;elm:context_link;itc:0;sec:content-canvas\" class=\"link rapid-noclick-resp\">Vegas Golden Knights<\/a>. The team said that Bednar suffered facial fractures and a corneal abrasion, but is expected to make a full recovery, without needing surgery, and be back on the bench for the playoffs.<\/p>\n<p><a href=\"https:\/\/www.foxnews.com\/sports\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\" data-ylk=\"slk:Click Here For More Sports Coverage On Foxnews.com;elm:context_link;itc:0;sec:content-canvas\" class=\"link rapid-noclick-resp\">Click Here For More Sports Coverage On Foxnews.com<\/a><\/p>\n<p>&#8220;It\u2019s certainly a little unnerving. It\u2019s scary when the pucks are flying in there,&#8221; assistant coach Nolan Pratt said after the game. &#8220;It happens all the time, and unfortunately tonight, so it takes a little second to sort of recalibrate and then get back to it.&#8221;<\/p>\n<p>Pratt and Dave Hakstol will likely coach the team for the final two games of the regular season. The Avalanche will hit the road for games against the <a href=\"https:\/\/www.foxnews.com\/category\/sports\/nhl\/edmonton-oilers\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\" data-ylk=\"slk:Edmonton Oilers;elm:context_link;itc:0;sec:content-canvas\" class=\"link rapid-noclick-resp\">Edmonton Oilers<\/a> and Calgary Flames.<\/p>\n<p><a href=\"https:\/\/www.foxnews.com\/sports\/2026-nhl-stanley-cup-odds\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\" data-ylk=\"slk:2026 Nhl Stanley Cup Odds: Colorado Avalanche, Tampa Bay Lightning Top Board;elm:context_link;itc:0;sec:content-canvas\" class=\"link rapid-noclick-resp\">2026 Nhl Stanley Cup Odds: Colorado Avalanche, Tampa Bay Lightning Top Board<\/a><\/p>\n<p><a href=\"https:\/\/foxnews.onelink.me\/xLDS\/mvaj7wvj\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\" data-ylk=\"slk:Read On The Fox News App;elm:context_link;itc:0;sec:content-canvas\" class=\"link rapid-noclick-resp\">Read On The Fox News App<\/a><\/p>\n<p>The Avalanche, who won the Stanley Cup title in 2022, clinched the top seed in the Western Conference on Thursday night with 115 points.<\/p>\n<p>Colorado star Nathan MacKinnon is leading the NHL with 52 goals this season and is third in the league with 74 assists. He\u2019s also third in points with 126, trailing the Tampa Bay Lightning\u2019s Nikita Kucherov (128) and Oilers star Connor McDavid (133).<\/p>\n<p><a href=\"https:\/\/foxnews.onelink.me\/xLDS?pid=AppArticleLink&amp;af_dp=foxnewsaf%3A%2F%2F&amp;af_web_dp=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.foxnews.com%2Fapps-products\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\" data-ylk=\"slk:Click Here To Download The Fox News App;elm:context_link;itc:0;sec:content-canvas\" class=\"link rapid-noclick-resp\">Click Here To Download The Fox News App<\/a><\/p>\n<p>The Avalanche have made the playoffs in all but one season under Bednar.<\/p>\n<p>The Associated Press contributed to this report.<\/p>\n<p>Follow Fox News Digital\u2019s <a href=\"https:\/\/twitter.com\/FoxNewsSports_\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\" data-ylk=\"slk:sports coverage on X;elm:context_link;itc:0;sec:content-canvas\" class=\"link rapid-noclick-resp\">sports coverage on X<\/a> and subscribe to<a href=\"https:\/\/www.foxnews.com\/newsletters\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\" data-ylk=\"slk:the Fox News Sports Huddle newsletter;elm:context_link;itc:0;sec:content-canvas\" class=\"link rapid-noclick-resp\"> the Fox News Sports Huddle newsletter<\/a>.<\/p>\n<p>Original article source: <a href=\"https:\/\/www.foxnews.com\/sports\/avalanche-coach-takes-puck-face-miss-final-regular-season-games\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\" data-ylk=\"slk:Avalanche coach takes puck to the face, will miss final regular-season games;elm:context_link;itc:0;sec:content-canvas\" class=\"link rapid-noclick-resp\">Avalanche coach takes puck to the face, will miss final regular-season games<\/a><\/p>\n<p><script async src=\"https:\/\/platform.twitter.com\/widgets.js\" charset=\"utf-8\"><\/script><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Colorado Avalanche head coach Jared Bednar will be seeking his second Stanley Cup title with his team, but&hellip;\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":534775,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[5129],"tags":[26,144,155,62508,6424,146,62507,149,5317,5,1117,517,4,1335,5380,1487,92,74,39,5316],"class_list":{"0":"post-551357","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-vegas-golden-knights","8":"tag-calgary-flames","9":"tag-colorado-avalanche","10":"tag-connor-mcdavid","11":"tag-corneal-abrasion","12":"tag-dave-hakstol","13":"tag-edmonton-oilers","14":"tag-facial-fractures","15":"tag-golden-knights","16":"tag-goldenknights","17":"tag-hockey","18":"tag-jared-bednar","19":"tag-nathan-mackinnon","20":"tag-nhl","21":"tag-nikita-kucherov","22":"tag-nolan-pratt","23":"tag-regular-season","24":"tag-tampa-bay-lightning","25":"tag-vegas","26":"tag-vegas-golden-knights","27":"tag-vegasgoldenknights"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/channels.im\/@nhl\/116393735171511115","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/551357","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=551357"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/551357\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/534775"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=551357"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=551357"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=551357"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}