Avs-Stars Ugly Game 4 Studs & Duds

The Colorado Avalanche received smoked 5-1 by the Dallas Stars in Recreation 4. These are the Avs Studs and Duds from the sport.

Studs

The digital camera particular person

Look, the Avs have been actively horrible on this sport. Who was I supposed to place right here? As a result of they have been so terrible, I’m grateful that the digital camera particular person struggled as a lot as they did as a result of it meant we couldn’t see lengthy stretches of this fiasco of a sport and that felt like mercy greater than frustration. Had it been a greater sport, I in all probability would have been much more upset by it however I’ll take a optimistic the place I can get it.

Jonathan Drouin

Okay however for actual, there was one Avalanche participant who I assumed performed nicely for a lot of the evening. Drouin made his return to the lineup and dropped proper into the spot vacated by Val Nichushkin’s departure and regarded engaged instantly.

He performed nicely with a splash of physicality and his skating was a optimistic on an Avalanche workforce that regarded like they have been skating in mud all evening. He nabbed a hard-working help and moved up strains when Jared Bednar was looking for a spark someplace within the lineup.

I’m pleased Drouin is again and wholesome. He’s enjoyable.

Duds

Colorado’s stars

The three greatest gamers on the Avalanche (Nathan MacKinnon, Mikko Rantanen, Cale Makar) are the important thing to successful a number of hockey video games. The three mixed for the defining second of this sport within the first interval when the Avalanche received their first energy play and these three performed roles in abandoning all effort and hanging Alexandar Georgiev out to dry.

Wyatt Johnston pressured Makar right into a turnover and Johnston proceeded to outwork all of Makar, MacKinnon, and Rantanen to attain a shorthanded purpose and put Dallas up 1-0. It actually felt like the sport was over in that second. It will have been much less embarrassing had it ended proper there.

These guys have been so dangerous that Colorado’s energy play received two alternatives and was outshot 4-1 and outscored 1-0 by the Stars penalty kill. They have been brutal all evening. They oscillated between pissed off and disinterested and as soon as the sport was determined they’d transient, meaningless bursts of life.

They have been removed from the one poor gamers tonight so don’t take this as me saying these guys are the only motive for Colorado’s embarrassing exhibiting, however they’re the core of the management group and set the tone for this hockey membership. The tone they set tonight appeared to be, “Effectively, we’ll be on trip in Cancun quickly sufficient.”

The place was the center? The place was the pushback? The place was the fireplace that made this workforce such a troublesome out a number of years in the past? Individuals need to come down on the Avs for “solely” making the second spherical over time, however they’ve a number of Recreation 7 losses in that point. We haven’t seen them this uncompetitive in a collection earlier than, not even the 2020 Dallas collection the place they have been ravaged by accidents and got here again from a 3-1 collection deficit to push it to a Recreation 7 additional time earlier than lastly succumbing…to Joel Kiviranta’s hat trick.

It is a membership that has proven that it could not win the Stanley Cup, however it’s going to struggle. Even final 12 months’s extraordinarily undermanned workforce that was cursed by every part below the solar nonetheless pushed and pushed to the ultimate buzzer of a nail-biting Recreation 7 loss to Seattle.

That we noticed none of that tonight was the stunning factor of the night. How can they simply give it up?

The information of the day

There are not any excuses right here. Everybody has curveballs thrown at us in life and all of us have to search out methods to hold on. Sports activities current distinctive challenges as a result of issues like playoffs are definable days on the calendar the place gamers must be their greatest selves.

To have the information of Nichushkin’s six-month suspension drop an hour earlier than puck drop after which comply with it instantly with Devon Toews being unavailable for the sport attributable to sickness? That’s a one-two that even Mike Tyson could be happy with.

Once more, I’m not excusing Colorado’s terrible efficiency within the sport however that’s an emotional boulder thrown at them instantly earlier than they needed to take the ice for warm-ups. It’s exhausting to attract apt parallels to on a regular basis life conditions however I see the place that will be a ton to soak up.

The terse postgame feedback from Jack Johnson and Andrew Cogliano concerning Nichushkin, specifically, strongly counsel to me that the locker room was very sad with how the day unfolded. That’s merely me speculating, however that’s my learn on the state of affairs.

I’m not right here to cross judgment on Nichushkin or his choices however to touch upon the way it all performed out so near puck drop. That’s a troublesome spot to be in for these guys and now their season is on the precipice.

Avs Unsung Hero

Alexandar Georgiev

The third purpose is unacceptable. Look, if a goalie offers these up often, that occurs! Georgiev offers up targets from distance usually, nonetheless, and you may’t wave all of them away and say, “However the display in entrance of him!” He has to cease these and tonight he moved right into a tie for the league lead within the postseason for low-danger targets given up with 9. 9!

That stated, the remainder of his sport was rattling good. He was the one motive the sport wasn’t 4-0 after the primary interval. He battled exhausting and saved the Avalanche in it. I’ve him on this space as a result of I simply really feel dangerous for him at this level. Even when he performs nicely, he will get lit up statistically. The Stanley Cup Playoffs are unforgiving like that.