With six days between games and his manpower situation changing, Avalanche coach Jared Bedar put together new lines and skated them through three days of quick-paced practices leading up to Friday’s night’s meeting with the Winnipeg Jets at the Pepsi Center.
Bednar said he hoped the moves, which included moving Matt Duchene from wing back to center, would develop chemistry and lead to enough production to make continuity possible.
The first night of the rearrangements was a flop, though it was largely due to the work of Jets goalie Michael Hutchinson.
Hutchinson, a 26-year-old in his fourth season with the Jets, had 37 saves in Winnipeg’s 1-0 win, and big winger Shawn Matthias, who had six goals in 20 games for Colorado last season as a short-term rental following his acquisition near the trading deadline last February, had the Jets’ decisive goal. From the right circle, Matthias one-timed a pass from Joel Armia past Avalanche goalie Semyon Varlamov at 8:29 of the second period and Winnipeg held on to claim the win.
Colorado was 0-for-4 on the power play, especially putting on pressure after the Jets’ Josh Morrisey went off for high-sticking at 14:50 of the third period. The Avalanche had 20 shots in the third period, and a total of six on the power plays. Gabe Landeskog had five shots on Hutchinson, while Jarome Iginla and Blake Comeau each had four. But the Jets’ goalie was up to the challenge.
“We had some chances and you have to capitalize,” Bednar said. “We missed the net a lot, too, and I think we can do a better job hitting the net. We were getting to the net, tracking down some rebounds. I think if you look at the second and third period, the more we shot it, the more we got the puck back, the more we started to find our groove in the offensive zone. But I thought their goalie was real good, and they did a good job clearing some of the rebounds in front of him.”
Bednar said of the power play: “I loved our power play, actually. That’s probably the most I’ve liked our power play all year, to be honest, even though it goes ‘oh-fer.’ The one power play in the second period, two full minutes in their zone. I mean, if you’re doing that and you’re shooting and you’re creating some good looks, I’ll take that power play over and over again.”
The Avalanche, now 3-3, headed to the airport after the game to make the trip to the Phoenix area, where they’ll face the Arizona Coyotes in Glendale on Saturday night.
Against the Jets, John Mitchell and Mikko Rantanen were in the Colorado lineup for the first time this season. Mitchell, the veteran center, had recovered from a hip injury, while Rantanen returned from a four-game rehabilitation stint at San Antonio after suffering an ankle injury Sept. 17 and missing the entire exhibition season. Mitchell centered the fourth line, with Joe Colborne and Andreas Martinsen, while Rantanen joined Mikhail Grigorenko on the Nathan MacKinnon-centered line. But nobody in Colorado blue could get the puck past Hutchinson.
“He played well,” said Duchene. “We had a whole lot of plays right in front that were pretty close to going in. I think we need to create a bit more. They didn’t create much, either, and it was a pretty tight game all-around. It was a pretty ugly game.”
Said Landeskog: “If you look at our shot totals and the scoring chances we created, I don’t think that points at offensive struggles. We created so many scoring chances. In the third alone, I think we had two or three posts that were rolling on the goal line and in the crease that we couldn’t seem to put in the back of the net.”
And the only goal came from a big winger who seven months ago was playing for Colorado. After last season, Avalanche general manager Joe Sakic said he hoped to re-sign Matthias, but he became an unrestricted free agent and signed a two-year, $2.125-million deal with the Jets. Eventually, after later re-signing MacKinnon and Tyson Barrie to extensions, the Avalanche ended up only about $1 million under the NHL’s $73-million salary cap, so there wasn’t a lot of financial flexibility there without other salary-pairing moves. Similarly, trade-deadline acquisition Mikkel Boedker also turned out to be a rental, and he signed a front-loaded deal with San Jose, getting $16 million over four years. That all came back to haunt the Avalanche on Friday night, and the Jets got back to 4-4 after beating Dallas 4-1 at home Thursday and then winning in Denver 24 hours later.
“It’s always nice to score against your old team,” Matthias said. “There isn’t any animosity toward any old teams. It’s just playing hard for the Jets and wanting those two points. The last two nights have been huge for our club.”
One silver lining for the Avalanche was that the struggling penalty kill, 28th in the NHL going into the night, was better. Winnipeg was 0-3 with the man advantage.
COLORADO AT ARIZONA, Saturday, 7 p.m., ALT2, 92.5 FM
Spotlight on: Coyotes right wing Shane Doan
A major junior teammate of Jarome Iginla with the Kamloops Blazers, Doan turned 40 on Oct. 10. Coming off a four-year, $21.2 million contract, Doan became an unrestricted free agent July 1, but re-signed with the Coyotes in mid-July, accepting a base salary of $2.5 million, a deferred signing bonus and incentives. That gave him a shot at spending his entire career with the same franchise, since he broke in with the Winnipeg Jets in 1995-96 and then went with the franchise to Arizona in ’96. His led the Coyotes with 28 goals last season and has a goal and two assists in seven games this season.
