Can the Avs Recover from their Worst Stretch of the Season?

The Avs are stumbling into the postseason. They’re 3-5-2 in their last ten games – a far cry from the 0.648 hockey they’ve played throughout the year. It’s officially their worst stretch of hockey – and that’s including the tough 4-5-1 run around the All-Star Break.

The Dallas Stars became the definitive Central Division champions and Winnipeg has an easy path to the second place spot.

The Colorado Avalanche all but lost the chance at a home ice advantage with two ugly losses this past weekend. Their first round matchup is locked in and it looks like they’ll begin on the road against the Winnipeg Jets. The Avs’ only hope at home ice is to win against Edmonton and Winnipeg has to lose out in regulation for their final two games.

The collapse started with an embarrassing result in front of the home crowd at Ball Arena. Despite being the best team at home this season, the Avs couldn’t solve the Jets and gave up seven goals in their shutout loss on Saturday.

They haven’t benefited from an easy schedule. The Avs visited the Vegas Golden Knights on the second leg of a back-to-back Sunday afternoon. They went up 3-0 before four unanswered goals allowed the Knights to comeback and win in overtime.

The issues this weekend warrant concern because it’s not limited to just two games.

Lack of Focus

When you reflect on the nature of their problems, it’s a matter of not making the opponent earn their opportunities. They’ve let it be too easy.

The Avs are left in a place of desperation, chasing games and trying to come up with goals.

Colorado hasn’t been the strongest defensive team, but they’re middle of the pack when it comes to scoring chances allowed.

They’re also among the best possession teams, so they often control most of the game in the offensive zone.

Being hard to play against and being a playoff team go hand in hand, and right now the Avs have some commitment issues.

If I had to speculate, they got too far ahead of themselves. Their sights were on Game 1 when they should have been more focused on the present moment. 

They’ve been gearing up for playoff hockey ever since their Game 7 exit against Seattle last year – anything to get back there.

They jumped the gun and embarrassed themselves. Their pride should feel the sting of this weekend, and it’s important that they do.

In his first game back from concussion protocol, Mikko Rantanen can be granted some allowances, but his apathy to defend Nikolaj Ehlers on Winnipeg’s first goal isn’t an isolated incident from the team.

A failed clear from Devon Toews against Winnipeg (and getting beat back to the net) allowed the first Adam Lowry goal. Toews was beat on the second Lowry goal as well.

Then Colorado played too deep and got beat in transition on Sean Monahan’s goal.

On Winnipeg’s fifth goal, Artturi Lehkonen’s shot attempt rimmed around the boards in the o-zone and the Avs got caught on an odd-man rush.

On Winnipeg’s final goal, Toews tried to keep the puck at the offensive blueline, but Lowry pressed the issue. The puck dribbled back behind them to David Gustafsson and Gustafsson sprung Lowry off the rush. Lowry skated ahead of Toews to the net and wristed the puck short-side.

In the Vegas game, a third period collapse destroyed their three-goal lead. It had a little bit of everything that’s cost them lately: penalty trouble, giving up odd-man rushes, and poor decisions.

On Ivan Barbashev’s goal, Makar chose a weird route back to defend the net. Instead of going back to the crease, Makar looped around and Barbashev beat him to the net-front and wrapped the puck around to the far-side.

Then Josh Manson was deep in Vegas’ end with Jonathan Drouin on the forecheck. Zach Whitecloud sent a stretch pass to Brett Howden at Colorado’s blueline and the Avs gave up a rush chance. 

Howden passed to William Karlsson on entry and Karlsson jumped ahead of Nathan MacKinnon on the backcheck and wristed the puck short-side past Alexandar Georgiev who pulled out to the top of the crease.

The errors from the weekend compare to the errors made against Dallas. Recently against playoff caliber teams, the Avs have appeared unfocused.

The Columbus and Montreal games should have been anomalies, but now with the results from the Edmonton, Dallas, Winnipeg, and Vegas games, Colorado has to get a better handle on playoff teams.

Penalty (Kill) Trouble

The penalty kill was top-five in the league in the month of March, but now it ranks 31st in the month of April so far. Over their last ten games, they’ve given up 11 goals on 36 penalty kills and nine have come in the last five games. They’ve also posted a bottoming faceoff percentage on the kill at 31.1% in the month of April.

Two powerplay goals-against in the first period against Winnipeg hurt the Avs, and the game winner for Vegas came shorthanded as well.

The Jets’ first powerplay goal highlighted a vulnerability at the far-post.

Kyle Connor found a seam to the net-front from the bottom of the right-circle. Gabe Vilardi dropped to one knee at the far-post and banged it in, similar to their first goal. Manson tried to get back to cover the net, but he was a touch too late having tried to confront Mark Scheifele out high just seconds before.

On the second powerplay goal, Monahan won the draw against Yakov Trenin and Josh Morrissey sent a shot on net from the point that went in clean.

Against Vegas, a failed clear from Brandon Duhaime was stopped by Ivan Barbashev at the point. Karlsson wristed the puck off the far-post and in. Nicolas Roy was at the crease as a screen in the shot line.

In addition to their recent struggles on the kill, the Avs have also struggled to stay out of the box. They’ve taken the third most penalties in April (25) and Manson’s three trips to the box against Vegas punctuated the problem.

Penalty trouble corroborates a focus problem as well. Guys have a little less control of their sticks (and themselves) when they’re not locked in and when they’re making desperate plays.

One More Save

Colorado has allowed the most goals-against in the month of April (32), and has the seventh lowest high-danger save percentage on the year.

Winnipeg wasn’t a good showing for either goaltender.

To cast a vote of confidence, Jared Bednar went back to Georgiev in net against Vegas.

Georgiev was good when the team was up, but when the team fell apart in front of him, he fell apart with them.

Barbashev’s wrap-around goal to put Vegas on the board shouldn’t have happened. Three of Vegas’ goals came on medium-to-low danger chances.

In April (and his last five starts), Georgiev’s goals-against-average is the second highest in the league (5.21). His final act of the regular season has not been inspiring.

What I wrote about him after the Dallas game remains true: “It’s hard to think of a game this season that Georgiev stole for the Avs.”

He still has among the lowest goals-saved above expected and the Avs still have the highest Goals-for in the league (297).

On the whole, it’s hard to say that he hasn’t received goal support along the way. When you look at their comeback wins, it points to desperate and necessary goal scoring to keep the Avs in games.

Obviously the Avs haven’t always come through (Winnipeg), but they’ve rescued games in a way that Georgiev hasn’t.

That’s a lot of pressure riding on the guys in front of him.

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They’re one game away from the conclusion of the regular season and playing their worst hockey. That said, an 82 game season is made up of many ten-game stretches that tell the whole story.

The Avs went 4-5-1 in the last ten of their Cup season, but the circumstances were understandably a bit different. They clinched the West in March and rested key players in the final stretch.

Last year’s team won the Central and went 8-1-1 in their last ten only to get ousted in the first round against a Wild Card team. Things fell apart in that Seattle series when Makar was suspended, Val Nichushkin left the team, and injuries crept up on several players.

All that to say, the playoffs are their own beast. I don’t feel comfortable projecting Colorado’s playoff hopes based on one ten game stretch.

It’d discount career years from Drouin, MacKinnon, and Makar that have been special.

The Avs can put this behind them if they win the games that matter, but there is plenty they need to focus on to get there.

They’ll get a second chance to control their own destiny, but so will everyone else. The slate will be wiped clean for everyone once the playoffs begin.