Avalanche-Wild Game 7: By the numbers

It'll be Game 7 Wednesday night at the Pepsi Center as the Colorado Avalanche and Minnesota Wild decide their Western Conference quarterfinal series.
And, as promised above, here are those telling numbers:

4-5 -- Avs' all-time Game 7 record since moving to the Centennial State in 1995
4-2 -- Colorado's Game 7 home record during that span, with the last such contest coming on April 22, 2003 in a 3-2 overtime loss to the Wild -- current coach Patrick Roy's final game in net for the Avs. (Incidentally, the visiting team won five of the seven games in that conference quarterfinal series)
2-0 -- Minnesota's Game 7 record during the past 20 seasons, with both victories coming in 2003 and both coming on the road.
43-33 -- Overall Game 7 home record for NHL teams over the past 20 seasons. Fourteen of those contests went to OT, with the hosts and visitors each claiming seven wins apiece.
12-0 -- The Avs' all-time playoff series record when winning the first two games -- as they have in this series -- since relocating to Colorado

Denver Broncos' 2014 schedule: 7 need-to-know nuggets

In case you somehow missed it, the Denver Broncos' 2014 schedule was released Wednesday.
And in honor of Hall of Famer and NFL Network schedule-release show guest John Elway, here are seven need-to-know notables about the Orange and Blue's just-posted itinerary:

• The Broncos' Sept. 7 Sunday Night Football opener against the Indianapolis Colts will mark the fourth straight season -- each year of the John Fox era -- that they've kicked off the season with a prime-time, nationally televised home game. They fell to the Oakland Raiders on Monday night in 2011, beat the Pittsburgh Steelers on SNF in '12 (Peyton Manning's regular-season Broncos debut) and walloped the Baltimore Ravens on Thursday night a year ago.
• Incidentally, the Colts will be playing a regular-season contest in the Mile High City without Manning as their starting QB for the first time since 1993, when Elway and the Broncos battered Jack Trudeau and Indy, 35-13, in a Week 5 matchup.
• Of Denver's first eight opponents on the new schedule: each finished at least .500 or better in 2013, six finished with 10 or more wins, six qualified for the postseason and three of them -- like the Broncos -- made it as far as the NFL's Final Four (conference championship games).
• That rugged opening stretch is highlighted by the Broncos' Week 3 visit to Seattle to take on the defending-champion Seahawks in a rematch of Super Bowl XLVIII. The Broncos have faced the defending Super Bowl champ in nine of the past 20 seasons, winning four contests and losing five. As aforementioned, Denver routed the 2012-champion Ravens, 49-27, to open this past season.
• The NFL did the Orange and Blue no favors by slotting them in the first bye-week session (Week 4) of the season. It will be the earliest bye week for the Broncos in recent seasons and will match the 2006 and 1993 campaigns, when the Broncos also had Week 4 byes. That means  13 straight weeks without a break to end the regular season and possibly 16 consecutive weeks of action if they were to make it to the Super Bowl as a wild-card team. That's draining even writing about it.
• While the early half of the Broncos' schedule is demanding -- at least as we peruse it on paper here this spring -- the latter part is no cakewalk, either, with six of  the squad playing six of its final nine games on the road. That stretch kicks off with a run of three consecutive away games -- at New England (Nov. 2), at Oakland (Nov. 9) and at St. Louis (Nov. 16) -- the Broncos' first string of back-to-back-to-back road tilts since 2010 and the seventh such span since the regular season increased to 16 games in 1978. Aside from 2010 -- when they lost at Kansas City, Arizona and Oakland -- the Broncos went 1-2 on their three-game road trips in '97, '95, '94, '81 and '79.
• The Broncos' Dec. 22 game in Cincinnati will mark the final Monday Night Football contest of the season and the Broncos' 23rd straight season with a MNF appearance. The 1991 campaign was the last Denver season without a Monday night tilt.

Declining 21 wins, Nuggets' fall is 2nd-worst

Let's get this out of the way up front: The Denver Nuggets' 36-46 finish certainly wasn't a Laker-esque disaster (27-55, worst record since moving to L.A.), and it wasn't even one of the 10 worst single-season records in franchise history.
But the Nugs' first sub-.500, non-playoff season in more than a decade did mark the second-largest single-season decline in the franchise's 48 years.
In their history, the Nuggets have seen their win total drop 10 or more victories nine times from one season to the next. Only twice has the dropoff reached 20 or more wins, and in falling from a franchise-best 57-25 (.695) last season to 36-46, the 2013-14 squad's 21-game fall checks in solidly at No. 2 on the list.
The worst?Try Paul Westhead's lowlight of a debut season in the MIle High City as his 1990-91 crew finished 20-62 (.244) on the heels of a 43-39 (.524) campaign the year prior.
Ouch.
Still, Brian Shaw's injury-addled team wasn't far behind, losing 23 of its final 35 games to post the franchise's worst mark since the 17-65 embarrassment of 2002-03.
Those Nuggets wound up missing out on the LeBron James sweepstakes that summer but did wind up with the third overall pick in the draft and some cat named Carmelo.
These current Nugs should be so lucky.

Recent history not on Avs' side

Hey, kudos to first-year coach Patrick Roy and the Colorado Avalanche.
They just capped off one of the greatest regular-season turnarounds in modern NHL history by improving a full .277 in points percentage (.406 to .683).
By estimations, that's the fifth-highest points percentage improvement the league has seen since 1980, with only the 1993-94 San Jose Sharks (+.345), 1981-82 Winnipeg Jets (+.300), 1992-93 Quebec Nordiques (+.294) and 2006-07 Pittsburgh Penguins (+.286) gaining more ground during a single season.
But now comes the hard part: Turning that turnaround into playoff success.
And, simply put, recent NHL history isn't on the Avs' side.
Since 1980, 15 NHL squads have improved by at least .200 in points percentage from the previous season. But here's how they fared in the playoffs:

• 10 of the 15 lost their first postseason series, with eight of those 10 failing to take advantage of home ice and falling to lower-seeded teams
• One squad won its first playoff series before falling in the ensuing round
• Three of the 15 won at least two postseason series before falling in the conference finals
• One team ( the 2005-06 Carolina Hurricanes, who improved .220) capped its Cinderella-esque season by hoisting the Stanley Cup

So will the Avs buck the trend and become the second team on this list to make it to the Stanley Cup Finals? Or will they fail to win even a single postseason series, as a full two-thirds of their most-improved compatriots have done?

The answer will start to take shape Thursday night when the Avs host the Minnesota Wild in Game 1 of the Western Conference quarterfinals.

Avalanche still chasing '92-93 Nordiques

So this current edition of the Colorado Avalanche -- which has gone from second worst in the league to challenging for the best record in the Western Conference and is a win away from matching the all-time franchise single-season record -- is easily the most improved team in franchise history, right?
Not so fast.
In fact, make that a "possibly."

Avs' turnaround turning heads

With six games remaining, the Colorado Avalanche are on the verge of making the biggest one-season turnaround in Colorado pro sports history.
We judge this by the teams' overall place in their respective league standings, and a year ago, the Avs were well on their way to compiling the second-worst record (16-25-7, 39 points) in the NHL. This year, Patrick Roy's kiddie crew currently owns the fifth-best mark (49-21-6, 104 points) in the league -- a whopping 24-place improvement.

Franchise tale of the tape: Rocks vs. Fish

Since joining the National League as expansion cousins in 1993, the Colorado Rockies and Miami Marlins have been linked.

So 21 years later -- and in the midst of their season-opening four-game series -- what better time to examine a 16-item tale of the tape (covering the 21 seasons spanning '93 through 2013) and see who's ahead: Rocks or Fish?

Bear with me through this longer-than-usual post . . . 

All-time win percentage: Rockies .472 (1,575-1,765), Marlins .468 (1,566-1,768)

Notable: Real close with Colorado owning nine more wins and only three fewer losses.

Advantage: Slightest of edges to Rocks