In a first-round playoff preview Saturday, the Colorado Avalanche fell completely flat at Ball Arena against the Winnipeg Jets. The defense was non-existent, leading to several goals and Alexandar Georgiev was pulled after the fourth goal allowed in the first period. Backup Justus Annunen allowed another three, creating the final score of 7-0.
This is unacceptable. The Colorado Avalanche are a playoff team by standings/clinching a playoff spot recently, but they don't play like a playoff team enough for my liking. Yeah, Georgiev has the most wins as a starting goaltender this season, but he has also allowed four or more goals in one game on several occasions. As evident by Saturday's result, that's not going to cut it against top-tier teams.
It is not all on Georgiev and Annunen, though. It felt as if the entire team was just asleep. In the first period, the Jets out-shot the Avalanche 16-6. While the shots evened out more in the second (22-17 through two periods), the game was easily out of hand at that point.
While the Avalanche can brag that they have some superstars, those superstars cannot always be asked to bring the team out of a deep hole. That's just not going to cut it. It hasn't cut it. Having a bunch of comeback victories is great, but we shouldn't have to go through that. We fell behind against some very weak teams earlier in the year and while we came back, there's no reason we should have fallen behind.
If this type of play continues in the remaining regular season games and the first few playoff games, the Colorado Avalanche are not going to make it very far in the 2023-24 NHL Stanley Cup playoffs. Something desperately needs to change and it needs to change fast. My fear is that if they haven't figured something out by now, they won't be able to figure it out in time. The Avalanche are 0-3 against the Winnipeg Jets this season.