Colorado Avalanche: 5 Keys for the 1st Road Trip 2019-2020

The Colorado Avalanche are on the road for the longest roadie of the season. Here are some keys for them to find success.

The Colorado Avalanche are about to embark on the longest road trip of the season, and it’s a brutal one. They’ll face six teams in 12 days. For five of those games and eight of those days, they’ll be unrelentingly on the road.

Well, time for them to share some secrets, eh, over cups of hot chocolate? (Or something a little stronger.)

Let’s look at the six teams the Avalanche will be facing:

• Washington Capitals
• Pittsburgh Penguins
• Florida Panthers
• Tampa Bay Lightning
• St. Louis Blues
• Vegas Golden Knights

With parity the way it is in the league, no game is an easy one. But those are still some tough opponents — teams that have won scoring titles and Stanley Cups and regular season awards. More All Stars than you can shake a stick at.

What’s more, this roadie presents special challenges. The Avalanche start with a stint on the East Coast, drop down to Florida… and then make their way back west? As far west as Las Vegas?

Now, granted, between the St. Louis and Vegas games there are three days. The players will return home for at least a couple days. Still, that’s a lot of traveling.

So, one key to the roadie is to avoid fatigue. Luckily, this trip comes early in the season, when the players are still fresh.

Well, the players have already made the first flight of their trip. Let’s look at some keys to the roadie.

2. Tighten the Game Up

The players and coaches alike claimed they have yet to play their best hockey. They’re saying it in the way of “but we managed to pull the win out anyway.”

Well, that’s not going to fly with teams like the Pittsburgh Penguins and, especially, the Washington Capitals whom, I’ve often observed, are machine-like in their precision.

One area I’d really like to see them clean up is passing. They played four different opponents, and they still struggle to make clean passes.

As I’m sure I will type until I slump over dead at my computer screen (hopefully I’m at least on a beach), the Avalanche also need to maintain their consistency. Play the full-60. I don’t expect playoff-level focus this early in the season. But just don’t let the opponents off the ropes.

3. Manage the Back-to-Back

The Colorado Avalanche have their first back-to-back series of the season. They play the Florida Panthers on Friday and Tampa Bay on Saturday.

That’s not too bad of a back-to-back. The two teams are close to each other, and the games are early enough that the players shouldn’t miss too much sleep getting from one city to the other.

What’s more, Florida isn’t putting up the best performances, and even Tampa has seemed human at times. It’s nothing like the one-two punch of Washington and then Pittsburgh earlier in the week.

I imagine we’ll see Pbilipp Grubauer in net one night and Pavel Francouz the next. Probably, to be honest, vice versa.

4. Keep Rolling 4 Lines

Last season, the Avs had one magical line and a hodge-podge behind them. This season, they’ve done a lot to address that lack of secondary scoring.

Now, the lines haven’t been consistent, especially in the middle-six. Jared Bednar hasn’t quite taken his salad shooter approach to line-making this year, but Tyson Jost, Joonas Donskoi, and Andre Burakovsky have been moving up and down between the second and third lines.

It’s been effective, though, as each of those players, along with Kadri, has at least a goal on the season so far. What’s more, the fourth line, centered by Bellemare, has been surprisingly effective.

Side note: For the briefest of moments, Cale Makar and Sam Girard were on the ice together during the Coyotes game. I really miss that pairing from the playoffs.

5. Play the Game According to the Opponent

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You never want to get away from playing your style of hockey. The Colorado Avalanche are a speedy team that likes to go on the rush. They play as five-man units across all three zones.

The Avs definitely shouldn’t try and change their identity on the road. That way lies madness — and losses. They were built to be the team described above.

However, as they learned against the Arizona Coyotes, you have to win every type of hockey game. You have to adapt to how the opponent plays. In that way, you might be able to win control of the game back.

The Colorado Avalanche are facing some solid opposition. They’re facing teams who have solidified their identities, who have won numerous trophies both as a team and personally. But Colorado has its own strengths, and they can force other teams to face them as long as they’re willing to adapt their game.

The fun starts tomorrow, an early game time in honor of the Columbus Day holiday — Colorado almost always seems to have one of these games. The Avs have 12 points on the line — I’m hoping for at least six.