Avalanche coach Patrick Roy tried to stay positive Friday. A day after his team blew a three-goal, third-period lead in a 5-4 loss to the visiting Minnesota Wild on opening night, Roy declined to show his players video of the 5-minute, 7-second horror show that featured four Minnesota goals.
“I’d rather show them the first 45 (minutes),” Roy said after practice at the Pepsi Center. “We talked about the first 45 because this is what we want to do. I wanted them to see the good things we did.”
Colorado led 4-1 after two periods.
“We had great intensity. We were quick on loose pucks. We finished our checks. We brought pucks at the end,” Roy said. “Defensively, we were blocking shots. We were patient in our own end. We had sticks in the right place. And we had a great neutral-zone forecheck.
“These are things that will make us win hockey games. If I show the negatives, that’s not what we want.”
The Avs practiced Friday in front of season-ticket holders who got the first glimpse of the team’s new third-jersey attire. The new uniforms, which include navy helmets, pants and socks, will debut Oct. 24 against the visiting Columbus Blue Jackets.
After practice, the locker room mood was much different than the night before. Players remain optimistic about the season, and defenseman Erik Johnson noted that the third-period meltdown is bound to toughen the team in future circumstances.
“It has to stick with us, maybe a little bit, all year, so it can remind us of what not to do,” Johnson said.
Johnson’s blue-line partner, Francois Beauchemin, said self-inflicted wounds are more easily fixed.
“Easy corrections because it’s not something that they did. It’s something that we did and we have to correct what we do with the puck,” Beauchemin said. “We have to make better plays, smarter plays. We know we can score goals, but we have to make sure we can win games 1-0 or 2-1.”
Roy will keep the same lineup Saturday against the Dallas Stars as he had with the Wild. He said goalie Semyon Varlamov is not to blame for the Minnesota meltdown.
“It’s an opportunity for a goalie to close the door. Yes. But we need to help him,” Roy said. “We didn’t help him in that third period. If you look at the goals that they scored, they were not easy saves. We need to be better, limit the turnovers in the neutral zone and not allow them to get in the slot area. If they score from the outside, it would be different.”
Johnson said the Avs were skating backward after the Wild scored to make it 4-2.
“You can’t be that mentally fragile to let one go in and let it snowball. We really have to buckle down,” Johnson said. “We said all the right things going into the third period, but it’s just a matter of going out and doing it.”
Mike Chambers: mchambers@denverpost.com or @mikechambers
