One of the great advantages of this weird playoff restart following a four-month shutdown is the expanded rosters teams are taking to their bubble cities.

While Conor Timmins certainly would have benefitted plenty from whatever playoff run a very good Colorado Eagles team was set to make, him tagging along with the Avs in their quest for the Stanley Cup isn’t the worst consolation prize.

Timmins has been a bright spot throughout this camp. It’s really a continuation of the solid pro debut season he had with the Eagles following missing an entire year due to issues stemming from a concussion he suffered at the end of his junior career in the spring of 2018.

Timmins has successfully rebuilt the hype that followed him in his draft-plus one season where he tore up the OHL on a spectacular Soo Greyhounds team. Now, the Avs are seeing firsthand what kind of player they have on their hands now that he’s fully healthy, confident, and not knocking off a year’s worth of rust.

“It’s been a tough couple years,” Timmins said. “I haven’t had a lot of opportunities to play a lot of games so anytime I can be around the rink and get extra reps, especially with these guys, is great for my development and it’s gonna be really cool to be on this run with these guys.”

The hope is the only adversity facing Timmins these days is a stacked Avalanche defense that’s simply too talented right now to find time for a player with just two NHL games under his belt. That doesn’t take away from what he’s accomplished in the last year, but rather a part of his current reality.

“Overall it was a good year for me,” Timmins said. “It was definitely a learning experience. I think I really developed defensively, Greg Cronin put in a lot of work with me with my one on one battles, my gap control, and my defensive zone work so I think I really improved on that. That was big for me, obviously up here in the NHL everyone can score and you have to be able to play defense against everyone. For me to put in that work was definitely big for my game.”

The strong camp hasn’t eluded head coach Jared Bednar, who has consistently liked what he has seen from Timmins in every camp he’s participated. Timmins was the final cut back in 2017 right after being drafted and then actually made the Avs’ opening night roster this season despite missing an entire season. Now, he’s once again pushing for playing time, however unlikely it may be right away.

“We’re still evaluating,” Bednar said. “Right now we’ve put Girard on number one powerplay and EJ on the second, they’re getting some reps in practice and we are keeping an eye on all the other guys here for sure. Starts with Connauton probably, with his experience, we know what Barberio has done for us over the last few years. For my staff, we’re looking at guys like Timmins and Byram real closely because we don’t get to see them as often as those other guys.”

About Timmins specifically, Bednar was not shy about his excitement about the young defender.

“I think he’s been really good actually,” Bednar began. “Noticeable skills that he has is I like his puck-moving ability, I think he’s a real good passer, he’s a real heads up player, finds a way to move the puck in and out of the zone. The things that we look at generally as far as that puck play and intelligence and being able to read plays on the offensive side of things I think is really good. The physicality and competitiveness in practice is starting to pick up in these scrimmages so we’re trying to keep an eye on these guys and watch how they’re defending in the hard areas, the corners, net front. I know we’re practicing against our own team but just seeing how he handles the size and strength and speed of the game on the defensive side of things and it’s been pretty good. We’re pretty happy with what we’re seeing here from him. Couple years ago he came to camp and really impressed and went back for juniors and then has gotten into some injury troubles but after playing a year in the American League and battling through some injuries even this year I feel like he’s in a pretty good place and is coming in as a confident player and a player that wants to help make an impact for our team.”

While he might be ninth on the current Avalanche depth chart behind the established top six and Connauton and Barberio, this time is still useful as he makes a case for not bringing back some guys next year. Connauton and Barberio are unrestricted free agents, which could open spots immediately for competition.

If not now for Timmins, it won’t be much longer.

News and Notes

• I was less focused on recording videos on my phone and more focused on the play so this will be a more robust section than previous days as I have a lot of player thoughts.
• Erik Johnson was awesome today. Flying all over the ice, creating offense and shutting down scoring chances on the other end, there wasn’t any aspect of the game where he wasn’t great. I haven’t been this excited about EJ since training camp of pretty much any year where he always looks great. He scored a gorgeous PP goal today when he split the defense and fooled Philipp Grubauer with a nice head fake. Goodness, what a day he had.
• A guy who I’ve been waiting and waiting to see some flashes from finally did and boy did he ever. Bowen Byram looked like the dominant player we’ve watched the last two years in the WHL as every time he had the puck on his stick, he was making something happen. He was aggressive offensively in jumping into the play and finally played with the kind of confidence you would expect from him. He was still so-so defensively but he was an impact player offensively and looked great. It was one of the best performances I’ve seen from him in an Avs sweater.
• Sticking on defense, Conor Timmins had another solid day and led to Bednar lavishing plenty of praise upon him. There were two moments, however, that showed where Timmins is still going to struggle some. He got caught in no-man’s land in the offensive zone when he took a step towards a 50-50 puck and then changed his mind, leaving him flat-footed. Given Timmins is not the skater some of his counterparts on defense are, this was a real problem for him and he gave up one clean two-on-one the other way because of this. Beyond those two incidents, Timmins was otherwise clean again today with a great stick defensively creating offense the other way. Offensively, he rang one off the post off a drop pass from Bellemare and was otherwise effective moving the puck.
• Nathan MacKinnon’s intensity continues to be a theme as he is getting after it hard on almost every shift. We saw just a tough of him floating in the neutral zone at times but as soon as he recognized an opportunity to get the puck, offensively or defensively, he turned the jets on and created havoc.
• The Bellemare line is totally locked in right now. They ground every line (even the Kadri line) they went against into dust. Just cycled like crazy and wore everyone else down. They had trouble finishing but had we been tracking Corsi, that line would’ve been dominant.
• Quietly with a strong day was Andre Burakovsky, who scored a goal and made multiple nice plays on the power play to either keep pucks in the zone or create a scoring chance. His goal was a classic wrister but probably should have been saved as Pavel Francouz got at least 60% of it before it snuck in. Burakovsky has moved around quite a bit during these scrimmages but he keeps finding a way to aid scoring.
• Same is true of Vlad Namestnikov, who looks like a picture-perfect fit for the Avalanche. I think if the Avs could swap Namestnikov in on Donskoi’s contract, they’d be all about it. He is so solid all over the ice.
• Easily the best showing from Vlad Kamenev, who scored a goal on a big one-timer just a few steps inside the blue line. He rocketed one past Philipp Grubauer and got some good vibes going his way.
• Shane Bowers participated after missing the last few days following taking a stick to the face last Thursday. He didn’t stand out in any major way but looked solid overall, per usual.
• No Cale Makar once again as he remains “unfit to practice.”

Post-Practice Audio

Matt Nieto

Conor Timmins

Nazem Kadri

Jared Bednar