Gabriel Landeskog’s return has played a massive role in Avalanche’s first-half success

The Colorado Avalanche have been hockey’s best team through the first half of the 2025-26 regular season, going 32-4-7 with 71 points and a plus-76 goal differential through 43 games.

A big reason for their success has been the return of captain Gabriel Landeskog, who after helping the Avs win the Stanley Cup in 2022, underwent arthroscopic knee surgery and missed nearly three full seasons. He briefly returned during the playoffs last spring, and is now playing in the regular season for the first time since April 2022. In 41 games, Landeskog has seven goals and 15 assists for 22 points, including 18 points in his last 25 contests.

However, the team is now without the 33-year-old winger after he suffered an upper-body injury during their game against the Florida Panthers on Jan. 4 and is listed as week-to-week.

On Friday’s episode of Daily Faceoff LIVE, Tyler Yaremchuk and former NHL goaltender Carter Hutton were joined by retired NHL defenseman Erik Johnson, who played 11 seasons with Landeskog and was part of the 2022 Avs championship roster, to discuss the captain’s impact in his return and how important he is to the team’s success going forward.

Tyler Yaremchuk: I think even the most optimistic of Avs fans probably believed they could win the Presidents’ Trophy, but sitting here in January with four regulation losses, what a start to the season.

Erik Johnson: I think the biggest thing for me is having Gabe Landeskog back, not only on the ice, but off the ice. I played with him for 13 years, and I just know how important he is to the dynamic to the room. Being the captain, there’s so much that goes into not just on the ice, but off the ice that you forget, which fell on the plate of Nathan MacKinnon and Cale Makar.

He is the best leader I have ever been around; he has that natural ability about him, and just having him around for dinners on the road, rookie parties and the stuff you don’t see behind the scenes goes so far for this team.

Having the stabilization factor with Landeskog has just done wonders for the Avs.

You can watch the full segment and the rest of the episode here…