Parade and parties over, Avs focus on Stanley Cup defense

By PAT GRAHAM
AP Sports Writer

DENVER (AP) — All the Stanley Cup parties and parades are over for the Colorado Avalanche. Training camp has arrived. Winning consecutive titles is difficult. In the salary cap era that began in 2005, the only teams to repeat have been Tampa Bay (’20, ’21) and Pittsburgh (’16, ’17). The Avalanche have some new faces, too. They traded for goaltender Alexandar Georgiev and added forward Evan Rodrigues. The team also locked up Nathan MacKinnon to an eight-year contract that is worth $100.8 million.