New-look Avs go right back to old-look Avs in lazy loss

I taught public school for a couple years, and there was nothing that got me more frustrated than seeing the same kid make the same mistake over and over, no matter how much time I spent with them.

That’s how I felt as a longtime Colorado Avalanche viewer Tuesday night. Seeing the same players, who should know better by now, make the same mistakes of the last few years? Irritating. Annoying. Exasperating.

I’m not going to run down a whole laundry list, but, to name a few: Erik Johnson, caught out of position a couple of times, including on a pinch that was way too deep in the offensive zone that led to a Nashville goal the other way (a goal I originally gave him a pass on, but after watching the replays – no). Matt Duchene, too high up in the defensive zone at times, and too deep in the offensive zone at others when turnovers happen with his line. Gabe Landeskog, seemingly falling asleep a little when the game cried out for a leadership moment, like when the Predators took a 2-1 lead on a power-play goal after a first 25 minutes in which the Avs actually played pretty well. Instead, no leader stepped forward. The whole core of guys who have been together a while now (Landeskog, Duchene, Johnson, Tyson Barrie, Nathan MacKinnon, Semyon Varlamov) all seemed to get that deer-in-the-headlights look to them at that moment.

The Avs’ play got worse from there, and it finished in a 4-1 Nashville Predators victory. So much for that “surprise of the league” start. The previously 4-1 Avs are now the 4-3 Avs, and it’s not so much the fact that they lost two games on the road that frustrated me as a viewer.

It was just the manner in which they happened. They looked too much like the Avs of the last two years, the Avs who just kind of fall apart at the first sign of adversity. They got jobbed on a couple of calls in this one (a non-call, non-tripping penalty on Alexander Kerfoot by Roman Josi that prevented a possible breakaway, a strange goal-allowed-but-charging penalty-to-the-guy who caused the charge, Colton Sissons), but instead of getting pissed off about it, the Avs just seemed to fold because of them.

Nashville outshot the Avs 34-21 and won 65-percent of the game’s faceoffs. The Preds had 23 hits and the Avs 10. Bottom line: the Avs got outworked, pretty badly, for a second straight night.

All the Avs could muster offensively was a gift goal to MacKinnon, his first, that went in off Josi’s skate. Otherwise, the Avs overpassed and over-complicated the game offensively. Kerfoot, for instance, had a point-blank chance early on, but opted for the pass across which was broken up by a sliding Preds D-man. J.T. Compher had what looked like a decent scoring chance in the second, but flubbed the puck away, leading to a Preds goal the other way (the goal that Johnson pinched too deep). Mikko Rantanen kind of just floated around all night, looking slow in the neutral zone and too deliberate on the power play from the wall. Nikita Zadorov was charitable with the puck in his own end a few too many times, failing to make the first pass out.

It all adds up to a wasted opportunity to really get a jump on the standings, after that 4-1 start. The question is: Are the real Avs only now showing up, or are these last two games going to be the aberration? Or, were those first five games the real aberration? Does this team really want to learn and get better, or are they just going to keep making the same mistakes again?

We’ll know a bit more on that Thursday night at home against the Blues.

Here’s how Jared Bednar saw the game: