Colorado head coach Jared Bednar sounds like a defeated man these days.
You would too if you were head coach of an historically bad team whose biggest problem is playing 60 minutes of competitive hockey with any regularity.
The Colorado Avalanche were manhandled by NHL competition once again on Saturday night, as the Winnipeg Jets (a non-playoff team) came away with a 6-1 win. Colorado was outshot 31-23 at the end of the game, which doesn’t seem so bad — until you notice they only had 10 shots through the first two periods and only shot the puck more than the Jets when they were already down 5-0.
Included in this game was perhaps the worst play in the NHL this season, when Blake Comeau inexplicably gave up on a clear-cut breakaway, and passed it backwards to a covered teammate. I mean, what the heck is this?
Bednar had to answer for this latest dreadful effort. You can hear his exasperation right off the top — the “Oh man” sigh sounds like a coach who’s run out of words to explain this mess.
“You know what, we had a couple games like this already this year. I thought we were past that as a group,” he said after the game (view video at the top). “It’s a tough situation we’re in there’s no doubt. I think it can be disheartening at times. But that has to (be) and remains unacceptable…We gotta play with some pride and tonight we didn’t have it.”
What has happened to the Avalanche this season is nothing short of a disaster. Despite having some great talent from Matt Duchene to Gabriel Landeskog to Nathan MacKinnon, the Avalanche could be the worst NHL team since the expansion Atlanta Thrashers, who won 14 games and earned 39 points.
Starter Semyon Varlamov is out the rest of the season, but that barely matters since he was running with a sub-.900 save percentage anyway. When asked about the goaltending — Calvin Pickard was pulled after allowing five goals on 20 shots — Bednar couldn’t even blame them for the loss.
“I look at the goals that went in there and again we’re caught in between on every play and they’re tic-tac-toe back of the net. You shouldn’t give up one of those every five games, nevermind three or four in one game. So I don’t think ‘Pick’ had much chance there. I thought (backup Jeremy) Smith came in a tough situation and did a nice job.”
Arguably the best piece of this roster all season has been Erik Johnson, a sturdy defenceman on an extremely thin blue line. Francois Beauchemin, once useful but now heavily in decline, still averages more than 21 minutes a game here. And although Johnson is back from a broken fibula that kept him out for two months, he’s not exactly up to game speed yet.
It’s been that kind of season for the Avalanche. They’ve had more than a few of these slapstick errors this season. Remember this “defensive breakdown” against the Kings in early February?
This is not supposed to be a tanking team. Yet they are 16 points out of 29th.
On Thursday, the Avalanche lost 2-1 to the Ottawa Senators, but were outshot 42-23 and only managed five shots in the second period. Bednar sounded almost the same in that post-game presser.
“Well I just thought it was…I didn’t think we were that good obviously. We gave up 40-plus shots.”
And against Nashville on Feb. 23 — a 4-2 loss — the Avs got just three shots in the second period.
Said Bednar: “Well the first and third were really good. Second was…I think that was an unacceptable period.”
With just four wins in 14 February games and trade rumours swirling around Duchene and Landeskog leading up to the trade deadline, the Avs are due for some big changes in the off-season. With another top draft pick coming in, perhaps one from their current core will move out for picks and prospects, or for a defenceman, which the Avs so sorely need. Although an Edmonton Oilers type trade for an Adam Larsson type defenceman won’t set the table again.
Bednar himself will surely be discussed for replacement come the summer, but if he was good enough for the job in the first place, should he not get a little more time post-shakeup? After all, he’s just one season removed from leading the AHL’s Lake Erie Monsters to a Calder Cup title.
Because at some point it does fall on the players when these kind of games become all too normal. The number of “unacceptable” periods have been piling up all season.
That’s one thing the Avs lead the league in anyway.
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