Avs Torment Canucks

Peter Forsberg's pleasure has been pure agony for the Vancouver Canucks.

During his career Forsberg has 13 goals and 27 assists in 20 games against the Canucks, including a pair of goals Wednesday night as the Colorado Avalanche defeated the Canucks 5-2.

Joe Sakic added a goal and two assists for Colorado, which won for only the third time in 11 home games.

Theo Fleury had a goal and two assists and Sandis Ozolinsh added two assists as the Avalanche went 3-for-6 on the power play. Patrick Roy, 22-7-3 lifetime against Vancouver, stopped 32 shots for his 405th win.

"I don't know why he does so well against Vancouver," Colorado coach Bob Hartley said of Forsberg. "He dominated the game not only offensively, but the way he was backchecking and forechecking."

Alexander Mogilny had a goal and an assist and Bert Robertsson scored his second goal in as many games for the Canucks, winless in their last five and 1-8-2 in their last 11 games.

Vancouver was 0-for-3 on the power play and starting goaltender Garth Snow lasted only 7:20, allowing two goals on five shots.

Colorado jumped on Vancouver from the start with two goals from Forsberg and one from Claude Lemieux in the first period. Lemieux scored his 25th at 2:56, converting a cross-ice pass from Fleury.

"We came out of the gate flying," Hartley said. "We had a great a forecheck going and it gave us great scoring chances."

Forsberg skated down a pass from Sakic and slid the puck between Snow's pads with a wrist shot from the upper right circle for his 24th goal. Kevin Weekes replaced Snow at that point and allowed Forsberg's second goal of the night.

Forsberg scored from just in frnt at 13:10 with the Avalanche on a power play.

Colorado was outshot 17-8 and outplayed by the Canucks in the second period, but extended its lead to 5-1 on power-play goals by Fleury and Sakic. Fleury flipped the puck over the outstretched stick of Weekes after skating past defenseman Murray Baron.

"You can't dig yourself that deep a hole against a great club like that," Vancouver coach Marc Crawford said. "We got better as the game got on, we hit three posts in the second period, generated more chances and started to do things right that we should have done from the start."

Mogilny scored his 10th after Darby Hendrickson's shot rebounded off the goal post right to him. Sakic sent a wrist shot off the stick of Mattias Ohlund at 17:41 for his 36th.

"Our start was too slow and our power play was poor," Mogilny said. "We played hard for two periods, but you have to have a good start against Colorado to beat them."

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