On Sunday night, the Avalanche won their fifth straight game against an Ottawa Senators team that traded for Linus Ullmark over the summer. While Ullmark wasn’t their starter against the Avs (albeit he did play a few minutes in the second period), he’s a goalie who is often connected to one of the most successful 1A and 1B goalie platoons the NHL has ever seen. Of course, this is referencing the years he had in Boston where he and Jeremy Swayman split duties.
The Avs don’t quite have the same jam in their crease. Swayman is making $8.25 million this season and Ullmark will have the same AAV starting next year. But, when they were together in Boston, the Bruins didn’t have a starting goalie. They had two guys who they cycled through and often played the hotter hand for a stretch of games a a time.
Sound familiar? If not, get used to it.
After Alexandar Georgiev started the first five games of the season, the Avs turned to Justus Annunen for each of the last four. And after speaking with Jared Bednar about his goaltenders, I’m inclined to ask, who is the Avalanche’s starting goalie?
“Going forward, we’re just going to play who we feel gives the best chance to win on that given night. We’re not handing out starts in advance,” Bednar said on Saturday. “The day before is as early as it’s gonna get for a while here.”
Sounds to me like Bednar, for the first time in the Georgiev era, is not outright calling him his starting goalie. And for good reason.
Georgiev struggled mightily in each of his first four starts and the Avs started the season 0-4 for the first time in 26 years. But in his fifth game, he looked a bit better. He still let in three goals on 19 shots — the last of which was a game-tying goal from a tough angle with 12.9 seconds remaining in regulation. But ever since that game, Annunen has taken over the crease and not given it up.
First, it was a 4-1 victory in San Jose. Then, a 3-2 triumph in Seattle followed by a 5-1 rout of Utah Hockey Club to complete a perfect 3-0-0 road trip. And when the Avs got back to Ball Arena on Sunday, Annunen was again the starter and made 26 saves in the 5-4 victory. He surrendered eight goals in four starts, though the last four came in the third period of Sunday’s win.
“Justus has played great. He’s giving us a chance. It just seems like he’s reading the play really well. He’s there early, understands where the shots coming from,” Bednar said. “He’s out pretty far as a big goalie so lots of things are hitting him and he’s gobbling up rebounds in the slot.”
So if you’re wondering who Bednar’s starter is, it’s simply the guy dressing on any given night — the guy he could rely on for a stretch of games. Is this recent stretch enough for Annunen to take over starting duties all year? Maybe. But it’s nowhere near a guarantee.
“Regardless of how the first four games went with our goaltending, we’re going to take advantage of guys when they get hot,” Bednar said. “We want to keep guys active but results are the most important thing and he’s getting us those right now.
“Pretty much every position on our team, they earn their ice time. It doesn’t really change for our goaltending. This could easily be Georgiev on a hot streak. It’s a long year. So as of right now, we’re just going to take it easy and choose our best goalie the night before a game,” Bednar added.
Calum Ritchie
The Calum Ritchie experiment went about as well as I thought it would. And honestly, if you’re an Avs fan, you should be excited for what this kid has to offer in the future. Over his seven games, we saw bits and pieces of the talent he has and why he’s a highly touted prospect. But we also saw the growing pains, mostly defensively, that he’ll have to work on to get back up to the big club. After all, he’s still only 19 years old and has a lot more development time ahead of him.
I always appreciate kids that make the jump on a good team. If Ritchie was on the Anaheim Ducks or San Jose Sharks, he’d probably get a much longer leash in the NHL and would’ve likely played more minutes than he did with the Avs. But it takes a lot to develop on a team that has little patience for developing younger players at a time when the main focus is winning hockey games.
This move will be good for Ritchie. He’s going to dominate in the OHL again and will likely be the top center for Canada at the World Juniors in a couple of months. His development is going to be crucial for the Avs, especially if they can get three valuable seasons out of his entry-level contract. I’m excited to see what Ritchie does at training camp next fall.
Ivan Ivan and Nikolai Kovalenko
As for two of the other rookies, how about a couple of first-career goals this past week? Both were assisted by Colorado’s top two centers Nathan MacKinnon and Casey Mittelstadt.
Ivan Ivan scored Thursday on the power play against Utah Hockey Club. He joined the top PP unit after an injury to Ross Colton and did what Colton has done so well — score. It was a nice moment for the kid, who slowly looked more comfortable with each passing game. It’s obvious that some of the guys at the bottom of the lineup are only playing because of the injuries the team is dealing with. And Ivan may very well be one of those guys. But if he keeps playing like this, it’ll be hard to pull him from the lineup without at least giving it some thought. He’s giving Bednar every reason to make it a tough decision if the Avs get healthy at forward.
Nikolai Kovalenko followed suit the very next game, scoring a tally on a 6-on-5 attack with just seven seconds remaining in the first period. Kovalenko’s goal was the type of play we’ll likely see him replicate many times over his NHL career. He was parked in front of the crease, stick on the ice, waiting for a pass. Despite his 5’10 frame, Kovalenko is going to make a living in the NHL by scoring in the dirty areas. He has looked very comfortable and should be a top-12 forward on this team even if everyone is healthy. He’s that good.
Congrats to both of these guys.
Jonathan Drouin
My colleague Colleen Flynn wrote last week about how the lineup should look when Jonathan Drouin returns and it got me thinking about this. It seems right now like Drouin is going to be the first forward back. Artturi Lehkonen might follow suit shortly after, and then eventually Valeri Nichushkin too. But when Drouin comes back, I can’t help but say he should be slotted in on the second line with Mittelstadt and Kovalenko.
Let Ross Colton continue to ride shotgun with Mikko Rantanen and MacKinnon until you get Lehkonen back at least. But for now, I’d place Drouin on the second line and slot Logan O’Connor on the third line with Parker Kelly and Miles Wood. Joel Kiviranta can return to the fourth line with Chris Wagner and Ivan Ivan while Matt Stienburg can return to the AHL and get back to playing a bigger role.
