“A huge honor” – Joe Sakic of Avalanche named General Manager of the Year
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Joe Sakic awarded the Jim Gregory General Manager of the Year
Joe Sakic of the Colorado Avalanche was named to the Jim Gregory General Manager of the Year Award on Thursday. The award is presented annually to the best GM who excelled at his role during the regular season. It is voted by the NHL GMs and a panel of NHL executives and print and broadcast media after the second round of the Stanley Cup playoffs. The award was presented to Joe Sakic at the 2022 Upper Deck NHL Draft by Montreal Canadiens legend Serge Savard.
He has been a part of the Avalanche since his promotion as the executive advisor on May 10th, 2013, and has helped form the team that won the 2022 Stanley Cup Championship, defeating the Tampa Bay Lightning in the Final in six games. He noted, “It’s a huge honor”. “You’re being voted on by your peers and it’s a huge honor. I know it’s a team award.”
Sakic further commented, “We’ve got a great staff. (Assistant GM) Chris MacFarland is huge on it. We do everything together. Our scouts, every one of them, pro, amateur. It’s the team, the players, they were so committed this year, the coaching staff. To me it’s not an individual award, it’s an organizational award.”
Joe Sakic gets the Jim Gregory General Manager of the Year Award
Colorado Avalanche had missed the playoffs three straight seasons when Sakic joined the team back in 2013. Four seasons later the team once again finished last in the NHL standings, since then the Avalanche qualified five straight seasons for the playoffs, as reported on nhl.com. After its 2022 Stanley Cup win, defenceman Erik Johnson said a few words for Sakic.
He continued, “He’s just been calm and cool and stuck with us”. “We finished last in the League in 2016-17, and ‘Gabe’ [Gabriel Landeskog] and I went to him and said, ‘We want to be part of the solution here,’ and he said, ‘Well, can’t make you any promises,’ but he stuck with us and we got it done. And it’s all worth it now. He deserves a lot of credit. He built a winner.”
Joe Sakic is the Avalanche/Quebec Nordiques all-time leader in 1,378 games played, with 625 goals, 1,016 assists, and 1,641 points. The Hall of Famer played 20 seasons with them from 1988-2009, including captaining the team to Stanley Cup Championship twice in 1996. He won the Conn Smythe Trophy as the playoff MVP.
Cale Makar quoted, “You can tell just talking to them, and Joe’s obviously done such a great job of putting the pieces together for a team that’s been able to compete year in and year out now. So, it’s exciting that he’s been nominated, because he definitely deserves it, where our team was and is now.”
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Kaushani Chatterjee
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