Avalanche Room: Bednar Not Happy With Energy After Day Off

You’re supposed to have a little bit more energy after a day off, right? Apparently that’s not always the case for the Colorado Avalanche.

After Sunday’s emotional comeback win against the Pittsburgh Penguins, the Avalanche were given a full day off on Monday. Considering Sunday’s game was an afternoon affair, it was more like a day and a half. That might have worked against them on Tuesday, as they looked discombobulated and out of it against the Montreal Canadiens, falling 2-1 to the visiting squad.

Cale Makar spoke about how they have lessons they can learn from a loss like this, while Jared Bednar talked about his team lacking energy after the day off.

Cale Makar

Jared Bednar on the frustrations of the game:

“It’s frustrating because we didn’t check hard enough in the first period. Tonight, we don’t outscore our mistakes, so it’s frustrating. We’ve been doing that. I like the way our team’s defended, but not in the first period against Pittsburgh, not in the first period tonight, and tonight it cost us. They go up one on us, and we fight the whole game trying to get it back, and their goalie played well and we missed on some really good opportunities. Every time you lose, it’s frustrating, but it is what it is.”

Bednar on how Montreal defended his Avalanche:

“They blocked a lot of shots. That’s what they did, and their goalie played well. He didn’t give up any rebounds and then we were walking into some pretty good scoring areas on multiple occasions and we either miss nets because of their positioning, or they got pieces of them and blocked them. We just didn’t do enough.”

Bednar on if the energy of the Avalanche was flat:

“Yep. I mean, we just weren’t pushing the way we can. Looked like the energy was down. I’ve said this before – I don’t like our team after full days off, but we’ve been on a pretty good run here lately. Big emotional game. It can happen, you just don’t have it every single night, but still frustrating.”

Bednar on the extension for Justus Annunen:

“I think he’s put a lot of work into his game over the last three years. He’s developed nicely and you can see what he’s doing here. Maybe he wants one of the first two back, or maybe even both, but he still played a solid hockey game for us and gave us a chance to win. He’s given us a chance to win, you look at his starts, they’ve been quality start after quality start and so, I think he gets rewareded with a two-way deal. He’s earned it.”