"[Cogliano] is a heart-and-soul guy, a veteran guy with a deep desire to win. We lost him in the Edmonton series, he breaks his hand, has surgery and he's the first guy back, working to try to get back and help our team. That's not easy to do. Our guys from the second he walked into the room, looked up to this guy because of the way he handles himself, him and [forward] Darren Helm, what they've put in and how they take care of themselves, how they prepare, how serious everything is for them and how much they want to win."
Cogliano was acquired by the Avalanche from the San Jose Sharks on March 21. He has 426 points (174 goals, 252 assists) in 1,140 regular-season games with the Oilers, Anaheim Ducks, Dallas Stars, Sharks and Avalanche. Cogliano was selected by Edmonton with the No. 25 pick in the 2005 NHL Draft,
He's played 116 Stanley Cup Playoff games and reached the Final in 2020 with the Stars, when they lost to the Lightning in six games.
Cogliano hasn't been with the Avalanche for long, but he's a respected player in the League and his words meant a lot to his teammates.
"When a guy like that talks, you listen," defenseman Cale Makar said. "He spoke to us, it was him and 'Landy' [Landeskog] and 'Nate' [MacKinnon], basically just calmed the guys down and made sure that, regardless of the outcome, we just put it all out there and see where the game lies. That's kind of where our minds were at throughout this whole game. Our mentality was just to win that period, win that next shift, and so on. We were never looking too far ahead to the outcome. We definitely feel like we earned that one, for sure."