Here’s the chilling quote from Sunday: “The reason we won the game was our goalie outplayed their goalie, and when that happens you can get away with a stinker.”
The speaker was Edmonton coach Craig MacTavish, and he was talking about the Oilers’ Mathieu Garon and the Avalanche’s Peter Budaj.
So far, Budaj gets a “D” in his latest opportunity to lock down the Avalanche’s No. 1 goaltending job. Colorado has decisively outshot Boston and Edmonton and lost both games, and an 0-3 start is looming if the Avalanche fall again tonight at Calgary.
Absolutely, there can be a crisis of confidence after only two games.
It’s at several levels, including in the locker room, where teammates reasonably can concede that they have suffered letdowns at the defensive end yet still would be 2-0 with true No. 1-caliber goaltending. The Avs will be saying all the right things as the Flames game approaches, and beyond, but the theme from Pinocchio might be playing in the background on the locker room CD player.
They’re wondering, too.
Yes, already.
It would have been the same with Jose Theodore if he had stayed and opened with a horrible game that got him pulled midway through, as happened in Washington’s season-opening loss to Atlanta. But he rebounded with a solid game against Chicago.
It doesn’t help that while Budaj has held himself culpable, he also quickly has gotten around to lamenting “bad bounces.” That denial is the refuge of the underachieving, and his teammates know it. They also know the Avs’ public commitment to up-tempo, attack hockey, albeit with a roster not necessarily tailored for that style, can challenge the goalie more often than under the conservative Joel Quenne- ville approach of recent seasons.
So what now?
The Avs have little choice, in part because of their very public commitment to Budaj and the reality that backup Andrew Raycroft would have to flash back five years to retrieve his only elite-level NHL season. They have to ride out Budaj for as long as possible, hoping he can live up to the faith.
A trade? That’s phrased in the form of a question because there are plenty of possibilities, with the highest- profile candidate Chicago’s Nikolai Khabibulin. Can he be worth his $6.75 million salary and the cap challenges that presents? Can he still be elite at this stage of his career at age 35?
Budaj needs to answer the challenge.
Terry Frei: 303-954-1895 or tfrei@denverpost.com
