The Good, the Bad, and the Ugly from the Avalanche's past week

The Colorado Avalanche managed to improve their compete level, despite some glaring injuries, yet the outcome still hasn’t gone their way. A round up of the highlights and lowlights from the past week.

THE GOOD

1. The Colorado Avalanche seemed to have found a way to be competitive for at least two periods of every game this past week, looking like they could win each of them until the third period.

2. The Avalanche managed to earn a point on the road against the San Jose Sharks when they forced the game into overtime.

3. Matt Nieto scored his first goal as an Avalanche player against the Chicago Blackhawks. His goal was the second of three Colorado goals scored in 5:05 during the second period, the fastest three-goal combination tallied by the Avalanche all season. Of course, they haven’t scored three goals in many games, so that statistic may not be all that impressive.

4. Defenseman Nikita Zadorov continues to improve, intimidating players off the puck, maintaining possession and successfully carrying the puck out of the defensive zones, making clean passes, and re-discovering his slap shot. He actually notched two assists in the home game against the Sharks. Keep up the good work!

5. Alternate Captain Nathan MacKinnon added four assists in the last week.

6. Alternate Captain Matt Duchene tallied two goals and an assist over the three games he played.

7. Captain Gabriel Landeskog notched a goal and two assists for three points in the last four games. Mikhail Grigorenko, who has struggled with scoring, also matched Landeskog’s total of a goal and two assists.

8. Hey, the power play units seems to have found some momentum, as the team managed to score three times on six opportunities. That’s an amazing 50% of the time! Now if someone can explain why their opponents had 13 power play chances to Colorado’s six, that would be great. It appears the officials for the Anaheim Ducks game and both Sharks matches did not receive their gift baskets.

9. A big shout out to Rene Bourque who played his 700th NHL game against the Chicago Blackhawks! Congratulations!

10. Goaltender Calvin Pickard deserves some recognition for stopping 34 of 36 shot attempts to earn a .944 save percent against the Anaheim Ducks. He deserved at least a point for the quality effort.

THE BAD

1. The Avalanche have gone 1-10-1 in their last 12 games. For the season, they have been outscored in the third period 54-27. They managed to re-discover their game for the first two periods, perhaps the final frame is next? Please? Pretty please?

2. Finding out Matt Duchene was out with an illness 15 minutes before the game hosting the San Jose Sharks was bad. But hey, the people who were speculating about trading him got a chance to see how the team would look without him. Not pretty.

3. Goaltender Semyon Varlamov continues to battle recurring groin injuries. Coach Bednar said they were going to rest him through the All Star Break. Perhaps it’s time to reconsider a different approach to treating this injury. Like, maybe, surgery. Or put him on Long Term Injured Reserve for the rest of the season. Nobody wants Varlamov to do irreparable harm to himself for a season that’s unlikely to see the playoffs, except from the couch.

4. And for the final injury related point, Rene Bourque left the Anaheim Ducks games with a lower body injury. He missed the subsequent two games, leaving the Avalanche with limited options in the forward position.

5. Jarome Iginla did not play his best game against the Blackhawks. In his meager 8:46 on the ice, he was a -4. That’s stinky cheese kind of bad.

THE UGLY

1. Finding out Duchene was going to miss the Sharks games to illness was bad. Having a short bench because the organization refused to recall a forward from the Rampage earlier in the week was just ugly. Playing with a shortened bench, without their leading goal scorer, against a team they matched well against in the previous game – one has to consider if management cost the team a point. Also, the trade rumors reached fever pitch with people speculating Duchene was out because of a trade. Ugly, ugly, ugly.

2. Between the World Cup of Hockey, the NHL mandated break, and the All Star Break, this year’s hockey schedule seems more like a mish mash than a consistently well planned series of events. How about cutting out a few games to keep the players healthy instead of drawing out the season even longer? Yeah, too much revenue at stake for the NHL to shorten the schedule, but geeze, hockey in June should be a crime.

3. Defenseman Tyson Barrie ended up missing the last three games with a lower body injury. So with both Erik Johnson and Barrie out, the defensive schemes resulted in Francois Beauchemin leading the team in ice time, averaging over 27 minutes a night.

4. For both the home games against the Chicago Blackhawks and the San Jose Sharks, the fans of the Avalanche’s opponents came out loud and obnoxious. Cheering for your team is one thing, kicking the fans of the home team when they are down, that’s just classless. Colorado fans will remember this. And there will be a reckoning. Because the Avalanche will turn it around eventually. Hear that Avalanche?

5. While the 45 minutes to change the broken pane of glass from Eric Gelinas’ wrist shot against the Ducks was amusing, it may have cost the Avalanche the game. The Ducks were on their heels prior to the extended break yet came out with a lot more energy afterwards. Their coach even alluded to how the mis-managed glass break allowed his team to re-group. The Avalanche seem to have more than their share of bad luck this season.

RAMPAGE ROULETTE

Goaltender Spencer Martin was recalled from the San Antonio Rampage on Wednesday, January 18^th to back up Calvin Pickard. He then went on to have his first NHL start, helping the team get a point on the road against the San Jose Sharks. He earned a follow up start at home against the same team, with less favorable results, although he did not get the kind of defensive support he deserved.

THOUGHTS TO PONDER

1. While Beauchemin is experienced, he’s making bad decisions on the ice. Maybe it’s time to re-visit whether having a 36 year old log the most ice time is really helpful to the team. Zadorov makes the occasional mistake – that’s part of learning the role – but there’s a long-term payoff for the team in allowing him more playing time.

If the organization isn’t comfortable giving Zadorov more ice time, maybe it’s time to call up another Rampage player. Chris Bigras has returned from injury, Anton Lindholm is developing, and Duncan Siemens seems to be eternally waiting in the wings. Why not play one of them? While Cody Goloubef is a serviceable 5/6 player, having him on the top pairing is confounding.

2. At the start of the season, the only American hockey player on the Avalanche was Erik Johnson. With the addition of Matt Nieto, Colorado now has two Americans, and only one currently playing. Why is this important, one may ask?

Because USA hockey is on the rise. And it could be one of the challenges with Colorado resides with whether their scouts recognize the development of American players, or if past habits have clouded their judgment when evaluating talent.

One only needed to watch the World Juniors and the World Cup of Hockey this year to see how far the American program has progressed. Of the three other NHL divisions, all of the teams have at least three Americans on their roster. Every team with 60 or more points has at least five players from the USA.

The Central Division, however, seems to have lagged behind. The Avalanche and the St. Louis Blues currently have two Americans, and the Dallas Stars only have one. It’s important to note the Minnesota Wild (currently in 1^st place in the division – ouch, it hurt to say that) have six Americans on the team while the Chicago Blackhawks, hot on the Wild’s tail, have seven. It’s just another thought to ponder.

WHAT TO WATCH

1. Will the Avalanche actually call up a forward from the Rampage so they have a replacement in case of future injury/illness issues?

2. The Avalanche will host the Vancouver Canucks at 7:30 pm on Wednesday.

3. The All-Star Break will include a skills competition this coming Saturday followed by the actual game on Sunday. Nathan MacKinnon will be the sole representative for the Colorado Avalanche. Hopefully MacKinnon can find some encouragement in a more positive atmosphere and will return refreshed and reinvigorated.