Takeaways: Colorado Avalanche vs. St. Louis Blues

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The Colorado Avalanche dropped their fifth game of the road trip, making their record for the roadie 1-2-2. By losing to the St. Louis Blues 3-1, they also have a matching record against the Blues — 1-2-2. The Colorado Avalanche still have hopes for a playoff spot, but they’re going to have to make every game count from here on out. It’s not that our patience has worn thin — patience itself has worn thin by the lateness in the season.

That said, there are both positives and negatives to take from the St. Louis Blues match.

+ Gabriel Landeskog in one tough cookie.

I’ve tweeted it before, and I’m going to write it here. Gabriel Landeskog is a jerk on the ice. (I used a different word on Twitter.) At one point in the first period, a Blues player speared his stick, causing it to fall and break. Landeskog responded by giving him a mighty shove.

In the second period he labeled St. Louis forward Jaden Schwartz with a check that reverberated to the rafters. In the third, he shoved Kevin Shattenkirk for going after Tyson Barrie. Like I said – a jerk. Just the way a captain should be.

– Tyson Barrie is not a defenseman.

Can we just call a spade a spade? At best Barrie is a rover. Or he should be a forward. Stop pretending he’s a defenseman because he’s just not big enough. Or tough enough. For the third Blues goal, Barrie just couldn’t muscle T.J. Oshie off the puck. Oshie’s not a big guy, just 5-foot-11, 189 pounds. But Barrie’s not tough.

What’s Barrie known for? His offensive play. Let him just play offense, and get a two-way player on the blueline.

– Semyon Varlamov lets in big goals.

Obviously, he stops way more big goals than he allows. However, in every Avalanche loss, there’s a goal that Varlamov lets in that he should have just stopped. In the Blues game, it was the first goal. Sure, there was traffic in front of him — there’s always going to be traffic in front of him.

That said, when the Avs let so many shots by them — and they always do — Varlamov is the reason they don’t get blown out of the water. So much of that is because of his laser-like focus, which is something the rest of the players could use…

– The Colorado Avalanche can’t play 60 minutes.

I talked about this in-depth in a previous post, but the Avalanche just don’t stay focused for 60 minutes’ worth of hockey. It’s not that they don’t have the conditioning, it’s not that they get lazy about playing — they simply don’t stay focused.

Next: Are the Colorado Avalanche Immature?

In the game against the Tampa Bay Lightning, the second period was their best effort of the game as they got 20 shots on goal. However, the second is usually their weak period, and that’s what happened against the Blues. They played a rough, physical first period, and then they lost their focus in the second. However…

+ Colorado can play a physical game.

The Avalanche are known for their speed and their skill. However, when it’s time to get physical, they don’t rely on Cody McLeod alone. We know Jarome Iginla and Gabriel Landeskog are power forwards. Erik Johnson and Jan Hejda are big, bruising players. However, even players such as Nathan MacKinnon and little Daniel Briere were getting aggressive with the Blues. That’s a big plus.

– The Avs can’t manage tape to tape passes.

This one baffles me. The Colorado Avalanche are skill players. So many of the Colorado players have such soft hands, and they’re snipers at the net. Yet, as the NBC Sports announcers pointed out, so many of their passes in the Blues game were “out of the shooter’s wheelhouse.” It was especially sloppy in the power play.

Great teams have passing machine-like in its precision. Watch the L.A. Kings from last season — and they went on to win the Stanley Cup. The Blues were much sharper in that department.

+ The spin-o-rama is still working for Matt Duchene.

The mantra for the Colorado Avalanche this season has been to simplify the game, go back to basic hockey. Don’t look for the pretty plays. The spin-o-rama most certainly is a pretty play, and few seem better at it than Matt Duchene. Both his roadie goals were spin-o-ramas. In the middle of this goal-scoring drought for the Avalanche, the Savardian spin is still working for Duchene.

/The NHL hates the Avalanche.

How is it that the Colorado Avalanche have had a tough schedule all season, and they still have a tough schedule ahead of them? They’ve played loads of back-to-backs, a fair amount of road trips and have had only a couple extended breaks (four games). The Blues, on the other hand, just played five games at home before facing the Avalanche, and they now have 10 days off because of how their schedule coincides with the All Star break.

The Avs really can’t do anything about that one.

Well, the Colorado Avalanche have some positives as well as some areas that need work, obviously. They’re running out of time, but where there’s a will — and a fiery coach who loves to win — there’s a way.

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