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Tyson Jost revisits ghosts of past in first trip to Ball Arena since trade

The longtime Avalanche forward was traded to Minnesota for Nico Sturm in March before ever touching the Stanley Cup. Now he faces his old teammates.

DENVER — Players come and go. Sports, after-all, are a business. But some trades hurt worse than others, even for the players involved.

Tyson Jost was drafted 10th overall by Colorado in 2016 and became a mainstay on the NHL roster, until he was traded in March only three months before his friends and teammates lifted the cup.

"It's extremely tough," Jost said. "Yeah, it sucked. There were some dark nights where I couldn't really watch."

Jost was traded one-for-one for Minnesota Wild bottom-six forward Nico Sturm, an even trade on paper. The move though, was a financial one for Colorado. It cleared about $1.3 million off the books for the Avalanche.

The Avs were able to then sign big forward acquisition Artturi Lehkonen, who proved vital during the cup run (14 points, 4 game winning goals), but it was a big emotional loss for Jost.

Credit: AP
Colorado Avalanche's Artturi Lehkonen (62) tries to slow Minnesota Wild's Tyson Jost during the first period of an NHL hockey game Friday, April 29, 2022, in St. Paul, Minn. (AP Photo/Jim Mone)

RELATED: Avalanche trade Jost for Sturm in swap of centers with Wild

"It's just disappointing when you grow up and you want to win a Stanley Cup so bad and you're there for five or six years and you see a lot of your best friends going through that, and I had to get off of social media because it was super tough," he said. "Not gonna lie, I had two weeks there where I was in kind of a dark spot because it stung...There were some nights where I was crying myself to sleep."

Alex Newhook, who played with Jost for the end of the 2021 season and nearly the entire 2021-22 season, said the two became very close over a year.

"It's hard to hear stuff like that," Newhook said. "He's a guy that meant a lot to this team for a long time and it's definitely not the way that he would have liked to see things happen with us after him leaving."

Jost will get one preseason game to work out the kinks of his emotions, but when he returns to Colorado in March, there will be another banner welcoming him from the rafters.

RELATED: Avalanche free agency tracker: Who's staying? Who's gone?

Credit: AP
Colorado Avalanche center Tyson Jost (17) celebrates his goal against the Detroit Red Wings in the first period of an NHL hockey game Wednesday, Feb. 23, 2022, in Detroit. (AP Photo/Paul Sancya)

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