DENVER — For almost three years he worked and waited for this moment, persisting through pain, surgeries and setbacks. At one point, he struggled to walk up the stairs. At another, he thought about retiring.

Now suddenly here was Gabriel Landeskog, captain of the Colorado Avalanche, coming back from his knee injury in the heat of the Stanley Cup Playoffs.

“It’s playoffs, so not a whole lot of time to think about what’s going on, how it’s feeling, how long you’ve been gone for,” he said. “It’s just kind of like, get into it and get playing. So, yeah, honestly, it felt pretty good.”

Landeskog looked pretty good too. On an emotional night, in a hard-fought 2-1 overtime loss to the Dallas Stars in Game 3 of the Western Conference First Round at Ball Arena on Wednesday, he led the Avalanche with six hits in 13:16 of ice time.

“I was really happy with the way he played,” coach Jared Bednar said. “He was physical right away, involved right away in a lot of different aspects of our game, and I was pleasantly surprised with the poise he showed with the puck and being able to make plays. It’s happening fast. There’s not a lot of room. But he looked pretty relaxed and made a lot of plays for us tonight.”

The 32-year-old forward had not played in the NHL since June 26, 2022, when the Avalanche defeated the Tampa Bay Lightning 2-1 in Game 6 of the Stanley Cup Final to win the Stanley Cup.

This was his first NHL game in 1,032 days. According to NHL Stats, he became the fifth player to play at least 700 games and return to his team after an absence of 1,000 days or more, following Jim Peplinski (2,000), Mario Lemieux (1,341), Uwe Krupp (1,036) and Peter Forsberg (1,018).

Landeskog said he had probably played this game in his mind 100 times. He tried to stay calm, focus on the game plan and allow himself to enjoy everything at the same time.

“It’s a very special night, and from my perspective, regardless of the outcome of the game, I mean, that was a memory of a lifetime for me,” he said. “It was very special.”