The Colorado Avalanche are 0-3 but the problems run so much deeper. After they lost 8-4 to the Vegas Golden Knights, it was easy to write things off as ‘no big deal.’ Dropping a disappointing home opener to the Columbus Blue Jackets 6-4 moved things officially into ‘concerning’ territory.
But for the third straight game, the Avalanche have not only lost but given up at least a half-dozen goals in the process. There are a few things that need to be covered in the wake of the Avalanche’s 6-2 loss to the New York Islanders, some of them much more pressing than others.
The Alexandar Georgiev Era Is Over
Coming into the season, the situation with Alexandar Georgiev was a point of concern. On opening night, he had an absolute meltdown, giving up five goals on just 16 shots on his way to being pulled. For a guy nicknamed by Avalanche fans as “Fourgiev,” it may not have been a big surprise.
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Getting pulled against the Blue Jackets felt even worse. Still, he was given the green light to start by head coach Jared Bednar going into the game against the Islanders. On the plus side, he made it through the entire game this time. On the downside, he gave up another five goals, and yet still his .865 save percentage (SV%) was far and away his best of the three games.
If there were questions before about whether to start Justus Annunen, they are now gone. The Avalanche are in real trouble and a major part of that is the performance of Georgiev. His contract was already a touchy situation, but it seems quite evident that he is nothing resembling a solution in net for the Avalanche.
The Lack of Firepower Is Evident
It’s been talked about ad nauseam about how the Avalanche are thin offensively once you get past Nathan MacKinnon, Cale Makar, and Mikko Rantanen. Through three games, the three are the highest-scoring players on the Avalanche, combining for four goals and 14 points.
After them, it gets very dicey. Only two forwards have multiple points and just four have a goal at this stage. The only positive is that Casey Mittelstadt seems to be acclimating himself well, having scored three goals through the first three games.
This all wouldn’t be quite so glaring if it weren’t for the complete collapse of the goaltending. A collective 6.67 goals-against average and .785 SV% is tough for any team to overcome, let alone one that is missing literally half of its top six. There doesn’t appear to be a solution coming down the pike, so someone needs to figure it out sooner rather than later.
The Defense Is Thin
Coming into the season, the top four felt solid but there were questions abound about the bottom pairing. Just three games in and the defense feels like it is nearly as big of a question mark as the goaltending. Injuries don’t help but their collective play hasn’t inspired confidence, either.
Devon Toews was out with a lower-body injury which made the situation worse. Calvin de Haan was a healthy scratch, leaving Oliver Kylington and John Ludvig to fill in. Perhaps the epitome of the night was a stationary Kylington badly lunging at a puck as Brock Nelson deked Georgiev out of his jock en route to one of his two goals.
If Toews is out for an extended period of time, things will have gone from bad to worse for the Avalanche. The team’s defensemen are a collective minus-19 through three games and though plus/minus isn’t exactly the best metric, that’s an alarming number no matter how you cut it.
The Eightball Grows Larger
The Avalanche were behind the proverbial eightball to begin the season. Now, three embarrassing losses later, it seems to be planetary in size. The goaltending situation has to improve because it can’t be worse than it’s been but the lack of depth scoring, and the play of the defense are right there to present more issues.
It is still far too early to make judgments on the season, but the Avalanche should be extremely concerned. Even if everyone came back from injury, they aren’t going to hit the ground running immediately. In a division as deep as the Central, the Avalanche are quickly running out of runway.
