The Colorado Avalanche still have the potential to be a good team and make the playoffs this season. However, in the first couple of games, there has been a glaring issue at the goaltending position.
As NHLRumors.com has documented, the Avalanche have been looking to fill their goaltending needs since last season. With Pavel Francouz‘s career over, they sought a backup to Alexandar Georgiev.
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The Avalanche picked up Kaapo Kahkonen off waivers after Georgiev’s several rough outings this season. Not only is it the goaltending, but the lack of depth as well. Remember, this team is still without its captain, Gabriel Landeskog. Landeskog had career-altering knee surgery after last playing in the 2022 Stanley Cup Final.
The Avalanche and GM Chris MacFarland have not found a replacement for him or Nazem Kadri. When Colorado won the Stanley Cup, they had great depth. They had a great second-line center, were well-rounded, and played excellent defense in front of their goalie.
That is not the case right now. Injuries do not help matters, with Artturi Lehkonen and Devon Toews out of the lineup. Valeri Nichushkin is missing for another matter. Plus, Landeskog had another setback, as there was hope he could return.
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As Dave Pagnotta of the Fourth Period said on TSN Radio in Montreal on Monday, the bigger concern is the goaltending over the lack of depth.
NHLRumors.com Transcriptions
Host: “Dave, you mentioned the Colorado Avalanche at 0-2 as one of those teams that most people expect to be pretty good. I’m a little bit worried about Colorado; they’re not as deep as they were when they won the Stanley Cup, obviously.
And you couple that with, who knows what happens with Nichushkin and I guess they’re still hoping and praying that Gabriel Landeskog comes back, but they’re not as deep as they once were. And if they’re not careful and they don’t address it quickly, their season can go very much like New Jersey season, when a year ago, where they just don’t get saves.”
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Dave Pagnotta: “That’s the bigger concern for me, more than anything. It’s just the goaltending. Georgiev, he was okay. He’s been okay, but he needs to be good. Nowadays you don’t need great from your goaltender, but you need good, and he needs to put up a showing this season for this Colorado squad.
And yeah eventually the hope is, and the anticipation is Landeskog comes back, Nichsushkin comes back. There’s a full season of Mittelstadt there. This is still a strong team with McKinnon, Makar, and Rantanen and I mentioned contract year for Jake Oettinger in Dallas. It’s also contract year for Rantanen in Denver.
So there’s still a lot of good on this team, and I think they’ll get things going. And although I have Dallas taking the division, I think they’ll give them a little bit of run for their money. You know, Dallas, Colorado, and Winnipeg are still kind of at the top, although Nashville is probably going to have something to say about that once they get going. St Louis feels like they can get back into legitimate playoff contention.
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It’s a tough it’s a tough division in Central. So from a positioning standpoint, we don’t want to get too behind the eight ball. I think Colorado is, without question, a playoff team. I don’t know if they’ll go the route of Jersey, unless there are substantial injuries to any other of their key guys. That happens that’s a bit of a rough situation, but I still like the makeup of the Avs.”
Colorado is hoping Mittelstadt can fill the second-line center role. Once the injured players come back, the team should be better. If things do not change between the pipes for the Avalanche, expect the Colorado Avalanche to move to address their goaltending later in the season.