Avalanche Room: ‘Thought It Was A Good Goal’; Bednar Not Happy With Game-Changing Call

It looked like the Colorado Avalanche had grabbed an early lead in the second period after a nice shot from Josh Manson.

The refs had other ideas.

Instead of a 2-1 lead, the refs overturned Manson‘s goal, ruling that Logan O’Connor had impeded Vanecek’s ability to make the save. Momentum quickly turned the other way, and the Devils scored two quick goals to take the lead. The Avalanche spent the rest of the game chasing, and while they did tie the game up, a late goal gave New Jersey the win.

Bednar made it known he did not agree with the refs overturning Manson’s goal, and said as much after the game. He also didn’t like the too many men penalty the Avalanche were given, mostly because both teams looked to have too many men on the ice.

Here are the post-game availabilities for Avalanche players Mikko Rantanen, Miles Wood, and Justus Annunen, as well as head coach Jared Bednar.

Mikko Rantanen

Rantanen on the Avalanche struggling to find a rhythm after the break:

“I think after the first game, you should be ready to play the next game. Guys are trying, but maybe timing and execution is a little off, so hopefully that will come next game.”

Miles Wood

Justus Annunen

Jared Bednar

Bednar on Manson’s disallowed goal:

“I thought it was a good goal. I mean, honestly, I just didn’t O’C…he wasn’t going into the goalie without being hit. That was my take on it. That’s what I thought the rule was. They obviously saw it different. Big momentum swing there, right? Then we give up two after that, so we’re chasing the game a little bit. We do some really good things in the third period, fight all the way back, then big breakdown with two minutes left, we give up the slot shot right in the middle of the hashmarks, and it ends up costing us. Again, I thought, similar to last night, we did some good things tonight. I thought we got a little more competitive as the game went on, but all-in-all, didn’t do enough on the offensive side of things to generate the goals we needed, and I didn’t think we did enough on the defensive side of things to shut more plays down. We have another step to take coming out of the break here.”

Bednar on the too many men call on the Avalanche:

“You’ll have to watch the video. I personally think we jumped early, and they jumped early. Their change was equally as bad as ours was, or worse. Their guy was in front of our bench, and the guy was already out the gate at the other side. I don’t know how we just get picked out of that, or why it was called at all in the neutral zone. If teams are going to jump early, we’re both jumping early, I don’t know how they handle that, but I did not like that call either.”

Bednar on Justus Annunen’s performance:

“I thought he was okay. I thought he did some good things. He made some big saves…I thought he played a solid game for us, gave us a chance.”

Bednar on Lehkonen’s performance:

“I thought he was much better tonight. Took him a little while to get into the game and then he was really strong for us in the second half of the game. We flipped the lines around a little bit, trying to get a spark, but I like the way he dug in. Started to playing a little bit more like we’re used to seeing Lehky play, and that’s a good sign. We knew it was going to take a little bit…but he’s starting to feel more confident coming back from this injury and I’m sure he’ll get up to speed here.”

Bednar on the issues for the Avalanche the last two games:

“We’ve got to fix all of it, regardless of what it is. There’s no excuses. Every team is coming off the break, doing their thing, it’s hard to get back in the groove sometimes. It can be a little rust with the execution. Shouldn’t hurt the effort and competitiveness that you’re going to play with. These are important points. Some of it will come, some of it we’ve got to go to work.”