Colorado Avalanche head coach Jared Bednar took a puck to the face Saturday night during a 3-2 overtime loss to the Vegas Golden Knights, suffering facial fractures and a corneal abrasion that will keep him off the bench for the rest of the regular season. The team said Bednar is expected to make a full recovery without surgery and should return for the playoffs.
The puck struck Bednar on the right cheek after flying over the boards during the game, AP News reported. He left the bench and was taken to the hospital for evaluation.
It was a jarring scene for a franchise that has already locked up the top seed in the Western Conference and enters the postseason as one of the NHL's most dangerous teams. Bednar, who led Colorado to the Stanley Cup in 2022, will now hand the reins to assistant coaches Nolan Pratt and Dave Hakstol for the Avalanche's final two regular-season games, a road trip to Edmonton and Calgary.
Pratt, speaking to reporters after Saturday's loss, did not sugarcoat the risk coaches face standing just feet from NHL-speed action. As Fox News Digital reported, Pratt acknowledged how routine the hazard has become, and how quickly it can turn serious.
"It's certainly a little unnerving. It's scary when the pucks are flying in there."
He added a note about how coaches handle the constant threat of errant rubber.
"It happens all the time, and unfortunately tonight, so it takes a little second to sort of recalibrate and then get back to it."
That matter-of-fact tone tells you something about the culture behind an NHL bench. Coaches stand exposed. There are no helmets, no plexiglass shields, no protective barriers between them and pucks that can travel well over 90 miles per hour. The assumption is that it won't happen, until it does.
The good news for Colorado is that the injury comes at the least damaging possible moment in the schedule. The Avalanche clinched the Western Conference's top seed Thursday night with 115 points. The remaining two games are, in competitive terms, meaningless. Bednar's absence from the road trip to Edmonton and Calgary costs the team nothing in the standings.
The bad news is that any facial fracture carries risk, and a corneal abrasion, damage to the surface of the eye, demands careful monitoring. The team's statement that no surgery is needed and a full recovery is expected offers reassurance, but the playoffs are a different animal. Bednar will need to be sharp and present when the postseason opens.
Under Bednar, the Avalanche have made the playoffs in all but one season. He guided the franchise to its 2022 championship and will be seeking his second Cup this spring. Few coaches in the league carry that kind of track record into the postseason.
Colorado's roster gives Bednar every reason to recover quickly and get back behind the bench. Star forward Nathan MacKinnon is leading the NHL with 52 goals this season and ranks third in the league with 74 assists and 126 total points. Only Edmonton's Connor McDavid, with 133 points, and Tampa Bay's Nikita Kucherov, with 128, sit ahead of him in the overall scoring race.
That kind of firepower, combined with the conference's top seed, makes the Avalanche a legitimate Cup favorite. The timing of Bednar's injury is awkward, but the franchise is built to absorb a brief absence at the top of its coaching staff. Being sidelined at a bad moment is never ideal, as Colorado figures in other arenas have learned, but the damage here appears limited to the regular season.
Hakstol and Pratt will handle the bench for the Edmonton and Calgary games. Both are experienced NHL hands. The New York Post noted that Hakstol will step in as the primary fill-in, with the team expecting Bednar back when the real games begin.
Bednar's injury is a reminder of a risk the NHL has never fully addressed. Players wear helmets and visors. Fans sit behind glass and netting. Coaches stand in the open.
The league has expanded protective netting for spectators in recent years, but the bench remains what it has always been: a narrow strip of real estate where men in suits stand shoulder-to-shoulder with the fastest game on ice. Pucks leave the playing surface constantly. Most miss everyone. Saturday night, one didn't.
Pratt's postgame comments, "it happens all the time", are the kind of admission that sounds routine until a coach is in the hospital with a broken face. The Washington Times reported that the puck flew over the boards and caught Bednar on the right cheek, a trajectory that could just as easily have struck his eye or temple.
Whether the league revisits bench safety in light of this incident remains to be seen. The NHL has not commented publicly on the matter, and the focus for now is squarely on Bednar's recovery and Colorado's playoff preparations.
The Avalanche expect Bednar back on the bench when the postseason begins. If that holds, Saturday's incident becomes a scary footnote rather than a season-altering crisis. Colorado has the roster, the seeding, and the recent championship pedigree to make a deep run, but it needs its head coach calling the shots when the stakes rise.
For now, Bednar recovers. His assistants coach. And the NHL moves on without pausing to ask whether the men running its teams from the bench deserve the same basic protection it already provides to the fans sitting twenty rows up.