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For two full games this season, the heated Avalanche-Red Wings rivalry seemed to have settled down to normalcy. After Claude Lemieux and Darren McCarty worked out their differences in the famous three-seconds-in fight last November 11, it looked like the teams had returned to having hockey on their minds.

Yeah, right.

Detroit/Colorado was mostly normal for about 150 minutes of hockey this season. But on April Fools Day, in the aptly named Joe Louis Arena, Patrick Roy decided to reclaim his heavyweight crown.

Make no mistake, the game was chippy before Roy and Chris Osgood (filling in for the departed Mike Vernon) relived last year's hijinks. Although many of the frequent players in previous Avs-Wings brawls were little or no factor in last week's craziness -- Claude Lemieux, Rene Corbet and Adam Foote for the Avalanche, Darren McCarty, Aaron Ward and Kris Draper for the Wings -- the two teams, as always, found plenty of willing combatants.

The first signs of warfare came in the first five minutes, when the Avalanche's Aaron Miller -- destined to be a recurring character throughout the night -- and Detroit's Tomas Holmstrom got into a minor scuffle after Roy (already looking a bit cranky, perhaps because of his team's recent lackluster play) threw an elbow and drew an unsportsmanlike conduct penalty. A few minutes later, McCarty and Colorado's Jeff Odgers had a minor, uneventful fight.

Still, the teams looked to be concentrating on scoring and defense, not rights and lefts, but Detroit's stifling defense started to get to the Avs. As things heated up in the second period, Colorado's Valeri Kamensky retaliated to a Kirk Maltby crosscheck by bouncing Slava Kozlov's head off the glass with a well-placed elbow.

A few minutes later, the precursor began. Miller and Martin Lapointe started pushing and shoving, exchanging clever repartee in the process, and Holmstrom and Colorado's Keith Jones joined in. Referee Terry Gregson and his linesmen broke it up hurriedly, but this was just the opening match before Tyson-Holyfield.

In the third period, Sergei Fedorov broke the scoreless tie with two goals in the first 12 minutes. Since the Avalanche could barely manage a shot on Chris Osgood -- they got only 14 in the full game, including a miserable three in the first period -- frustrations started to boil over.

Then, at 12:49 of the final period, all hell broke loose.

Miller and Lapointe resumed hostilities (Note how we cleverly foreshadowed that a few paragraphs ago...) and all their pals showed up for the party. Tom Fitzgerald, Warren Rychel, Sylvain Lefebvre and Jeff Odgers jumped in for the Avalanche; Bob Rouse, Slava Kozlov, Aaron Ward and Kirk Maltby joined in for the Red Wings. It wasn't so much a fight as a grappling match -- at least until Patrick Roy flashed back to last season.

Some background: Late last year Darren McCarty pummeled Claude Lemieux in the first period. Similarly, all the players on both sides joined in, and Roy left the crease with the idea of helping the bloodied Lemieux. After running into Brendan Shanahan, Roy saw his Detroit counterpart, Mike Vernon, leaving the crease, and skated up ice for a brawl. The much-smaller Vernon beat Roy soundly, in a bout which has been relived far too often for the likes of Colorado fans.

So this time around, Roy left the crease again, neatly setting his gloves and mask on top of the net -- ostensibly with the idea of helping out Miller, as he later claimed, although since Miller was just lying there with Lapointe on top of him, he wasn't exactly in mortal danger. Roy made a half-hearted attempt to remove Lapointe, keeping one eye cocked down-ice at his real interest -- Chris Osgood.

As soon as Osgood, noting the six-on-five disparity, nervously edged a couple inches out of the crease, Roy realized that the Detroit goalie - who's slightly more threatening than Emmanuel Lewis -- posed a threat to himself, his teammates, and possibly their women as well. Roy forgot about Miller and skated toward center ice, signaling for Osgood to join the fun.

To his credit, Osgood did. The two joined ranks at the big Red Wing in the middle of the ice and threw down. Roy obviously had been in training -- he scored several solid rights before Osgood fell on top of him, and this time didn't leave covered with his own blood.

The fight ended with both goalies exhausted as Scotty Bowman had a fit, getting held back by his assistant coaches as he leaned over the boards and screamed at Roy.

To listen to Colorado and Detroit fans post-fight, one would've thought that each opposing goalie had been carried from the rink in a body bag. In truth, it was pretty much a draw -- Roy landed more punches, but the much smaller Osgood held his own (and did score a Mick Vukota body slam at the end, although he later claimed it was an accident).

As the two left the ice -- they were thrown out, along with every other player on the ice at the time -- Detroit fans chanted "Oz-zie" and Roy pumped his fist to the crowd as he received congratulations from teammates.

Too bad he didn't emulate Tie Domi and fasten the imaginary championship belt -- it would've been the most fitting end to a ridiculous night.

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