Colorado Avalanche at the Quarter Mark: An unsatisfying feeling

We’re 16 games in to the Colorado Avalanche 56-game season, so two games officially past the quarter mark. The Avs stand at 9-6-1, a record that looks a lot worse than it did four days ago, when it was 9-4-1 after a great win in the Outdoors Game in Lake Tahoe.

A look at the Honda West Division standings is something I would recommend Avs fans NOT do this morning. While it is deceptive, because the Avs have games in hand on some of the teams ahead of them, the fact is the Avs this morning are SIXTH in the division, with 19 points. Vegas, St. Louis, Arizona, Los Angeles and Minnesota all have more points right now than Colorado though, again, the Avs have four games in hand on the Blues, three on the Coyotes and two on the Kings.

But they’re still behind in points, and only the top four points finishers in each division qualify for the playoffs. There is now some real pressure on the Avs to get going, to string something together and not have to worry about just qualifying for the playoffs.

The Avs now go on the road for four games, the first two against the Coyotes. Then, maybe (as the Sharks are currently shut down because of Covid-19 protocol) two in San Jose next week (I have a ticket booked to cover those games).

I don’t think I’m too worried about the Avs missing the playoffs. I think those games in hand will reveal themselves to have been useful in the end toward that goal.

But I am worried about a couple things still with this team, namely:

• This team is one Philipp Grubauer injury away from potential disaster. The Avalanche right now have two backup goalies (Hunter Miska and Adam Werner) whose combined career NHL record is 1-2-1, with four career starts between them. Pavel Francouz, whose lower-body injuries supposedly were all fixed up entering this season, has yet to play a game and remains listed as out “long-term” with more lower-body injuries. If the Avs had a 6-8 point lead on the division, or at least ahead of the fourth-place team, things might not seem as scary. They could probably afford to write off a few games, let Grubauer play at a less harried pace and hope for a fully healthy Francouz by the playoffs.
• But now, the Avs have to win games like, now, to keep pace for a playoff spot. That means probably playing Grubauer more than they wanted. That means exposing him to potential injury as well, and we’ve seen Grubauer have some injuries before. The Francouz injury – said to be unrelated to the ones previously – has screwed up Jared Bednar’s preseason plan on the use of Grubauer. He originally said he wanted to play Grubauer only about 65 percent of the time, at most. So far, Grubauer has started 14 of Colorado’s 16 games (87.5 percent).
• I still see too much fancy-dan play out of this team. Cases in point were the last two losses, at home to Vegas and Minnesota. Avs forwards still try to get “too cute” offensively, as Bednar put it after the 6-2 loss to the Wild last night. For me, this team is always at its best when it plays a skilled – yet simplified – game. When they dump pucks deep, then use their team speed to hunt them down in the offensive zone, that’s when they became a really dangerous team and one that opponents have a real hard time handling. Instead, we’re seeing too much one-on-one stuff, too many guys trying to stickhandle through a crowd to enter the zone. It’s not enough just to use superior speed with the puck; you have to use it to go get the puck too. Too often at times, we’ve seen Avs forwards try to please the skills contest judges instead of just outworking opponents to pucks.
• I’ve been encouraged by the team’s overall defense though, especially on the blue line itself. The Avs playing with the puck most of the time and aren’t giving teams too many great scoring chances. For me, that’s why I’m still optimistic things will turn around. You know that guys such as Nathan MacKinnon and Mikko Rantanen are going to find the back of the net again soon. Yeah, it would be nice if some others could find their scoring touches too, such as Andre Burakovsky, Gabe Landeskog, J.T. Compher and Joonas Donskoi. But I think the Avs will get enough offense from here on out.

Avs are off today, flying to Arizona in the afternoon. As it stands, the back-to-back games against the Coyotes are – if not must-wins, at least very important games. The fact that we have to say that, at this stage of the season, leaves something of an unsatisfied feeling.