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Theodore makes 26 saves as Avalanche dump listless Senators

Oct 20, 2006 - 2:38 AM OTTAWA, Ontario (Ticker) -- Before attending a reunion with his former team, Jose Theodore took care of the business at hand.

Theodore made 26 saves and Joe Sakic and Brad Richardson scored goals to lead the Colorado Avalanche to a 2-1 victory over the struggling Ottawa Senators in their lone encounter of the season.

The 2002 Hart and Vezina Trophy winner, Theodore suffered a broken heel in January and was traded to Colorado by the Montreal Canadiens for David Aebischer on March 8. He is expected to face his former team for the first time Saturday.

"My focus was not on Saturday's game against Montreal, but on tonight's game," Theodore said. "I'll take the next couple of days to relax a little bit. Obviously, it's going to be fun and exciting to be back in Montreal."

The 30-year-old Theodore made 10 saves in the first period, seven in the second and lost his bid for his first shutout of the season and 24th of his career when he yielded a goal to Dany Heatley with 10:15 remaining.

"I thought Jose was great," Avalanche coach Joel Quenneville said. "It was his best game. He was really sharp that first period when they came at us really hard. He kept us in the game."

Sakic put Colorado on top midway through the second period when he took Andrew Brunette's centering pass from behind the net and knocked the puck from the doorstep past Martin Gerber.

A former Hart and Lady Byng Trophy winner, Sakic recorded his 577th career tally - 17th in NHL history - and his 1,495th point, good for 11th place on the all-time list.

The Avalanche expanded the margin nearly six minutes later while Antti Laaksonen was serving a hooking penalty.

Richardson carried the puck from his own end and fired a wrister from the top of the left faceoff circle inside the right goalpost for his third tally and second shorthanded goal of the season.

"I don't know why I've scored on the penalty kill," Richardson said. "I guess I just wait for a chance to go and when I get it, I go. I got between two of their players and then used the defenseman as a screen and I was fortunate it went in."

"We were huge starting out on this swing coming after some real disappointing losses," Quenneville said. "We turned it around with two real big efforts. We played really well in the second period here, our best period of the year. We did some solid things along the blue line as well."

Gerber stopped 34 shots for the Senators, who have lost five straight home games and are last in the league with 11 goals.

"You know how this is," Ottawa captain Daniel Alfredsson said. "It's frustrating. I don't know what to say about this loss. We're trying and we just can't get it done."

"We want to win just as bad as everybody else," Senators center Jason Spezza said. "We're trying, but it's upsetting to lose."