Voros' focus: Avoid penalty box

Aaron Voros had one objective during his NHL playoff debut Friday night: "Stay out of the penalty box."

So focused on that, Voros mentioned it a half-dozen times in a five-minute interview Friday morning.

"I have to be disciplined," Voros said before the Wild's 3-2 overtime victory over Colorado. "I can't take careless penalties. I need to stay on the ice and just bring my style of game."

Voros' style is high-energy, hard-hitting and driving the net, especially on the power play. But while his team-leading 141 penalty minutes were mostly because of his team-leading 14 fights, Voros also had a tendency of taking bad penalties.

Coach Jacques Lemaire, who missed Friday's morning skate because of illness, had enough and scratched Voros in 10 of the past 17 games. In his final regular-season game -- March 28 vs. Vancouver -- Voros took two minor penalties, one with the Wild up 1-0, one with it up 2-0.

Plus, when Derek Boogaard got healthy and the Wild added Chris Simon, Voros understood he was the victim of a numbers game.

"I didn't mind because the team was successful," said Voros, who didn't take a penalty in 7 minutes, 1 second of ice time Friday night. "My time will come. You just have to stay ready. We have a talented team and good mix of grit now, so it's not like November, when I was kind of alone as that guy. We have a plethora of it now."

Voros replaced injured Mark Parrish over Simon, who has 73 games of playoff experience and has been to three Stanley Cup Finals.

"We have to be ready and support each other. I think that's what a team does," Simon said. "We know it can be a long playoffs, and we're going to need everybody, and we just have to be ready when we're called.

"I'm very happy to be on this team. The team's been excellent to me from Day 1, and when I get out there, I'm going to play hard to help the team."

Defenseman Kurtis Foster, attending his first game since breaking his femur March 19, got the crowd going before the game by doing the "Let's Play Hockey" chant.

Because of the stairs down into the shear tower, Foster addressed the crowd from press row. He watched the game by reclining his leg on a pillow on top of a chair.

His days are spent doing therapy, watching TV and dining with teammates. "Mikko [Koivu] comes over two nights a week," Foster said.

Injured defenseman Nick Schultz was also in the press box for Friday's game, four days after his appendectomy. Schultz said he has put in some time in the water treadmill and has done some light work on a stationary bike. He hopes to do some skating on his own by the middle of next week. As for a return to action?

''My personal goal -- and it's just in my head -- is that I'd like to get back for the start of the next round,'' he said.

Wild assistant coach Mike Ramsey, unable to fly since February after having his retina reattached during surgery on his right eye, has been cleared by doctors to fly to Denver after today's practice.

"I never thought I'd be happy to hear I could get on an airplane," said Ramsey, a nervous flyer.

NHL Commissioner Gary Bettman attended Friday's game and addressed myriad issues, two that have specific relevance to Minnesota.

Bettman said there doesn't seem to be interest in changing to no-touch icing. Foster was injured when was hit from behind by San Jose's Torrey Mitchell while going for an icing.

"I've been at every meeting of the competition committee since it was formed after the work stoppage -- and this is both managers and players -- [they've] said they don't want to go to no-touch icing," Bettman said.

In light of the Foster injury, Paul Kelly, the NHL Players' Association executive director, said: "We think it is an issue that needs to be looked at. We intend to raise it when the competition committee meets this spring."

• Bettman said the NHL is looking at its rules regarding college players in the wake of two high-profile players -- the Gophers' Kyle Okposo and Denver's Brock Trotter -- leaving their teams at midseason. "We're sympathetic to [the issue]," Bettman said.

Staff writers Kent Youngblood and Judd Zulgad contributed to this report.