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Game #67 – Avalanche vs. Hawks Preview/Bake-Off: Once Like You

By Sam Fels 1763 0

 vs. 

RECORDS: Avalanche 35-24-6   Hawks 28-30-8

PUCK DROP: 7:30

TV: WGN

DISPENSARIES AND BREWERIES: Mile High Hockey

As they will spend the rest of the season pretty much, the Hawks will gaze across to the other bench and see a team they used to barely give a thought now playing for the things they want, i.e. a playoff spot and a future. While the Avs always gave the Hawks fits even when the Hawks were dominant, at least we could laugh those losses off as something to be washed away in the irrelevance of regular seasons. Not so much anymore. as the Avs are right in the thick of a wild card chase, with an MVP candidate in their midst, a couple other kids worth watching, while the Hawks can only try to mind-meld with the sand in the hour glass, forcing it into the bottom chamber faster.

How the Avs have got here is basically saddling up on Nathan MacKinnon and running him until he stops. Mac K has the best point-per-game mark in the league, and if he hadn’t missed seven games he’d be running away with the Hart Trophy discussion. Writers are going to bend themselves in all sorts of directions and binds to keep it from him should the Avs miss out, and Taylor Hall winning it sure would have Brooks-ian levels of comedy to it. But no one has played better than MacKinnon, and he’s caused a Gabriel Three-Yaks-And-A-Dog revival as well as kick-started the career of Mikko Ratanen.

Beyond that though, if you’re getting a hint or whiff of 2014, when the Avs were good because they shot the lights out and got Varlamov’s Vezina year and actually weren’t all that good and were quickly exposed in the playoffs, you’re not entirely wrong. Because it’s not exactly easy to point to what this team does well other than “have Nathan MacKinnon and his career-doubling SH%.” They’re not a good possession team, or a terribly good defensive one, They give up a ton of attempts but are better at limiting the quality of those, as their expected goals-against per game is 11th in the league.

The one thing they do well is kill penalties, third in the league, and you’d think with all that speed that would go hand in hand. So if you don’t give up many power play goals and can just win things at even-strength, you’ll be ok. The Avs have done that, mostly thanks to their top line.

There’s a touch more to them than that. Tyson Jost and Alex Kerfoot on the second line portend to a pretty nice future if they continue to evolve. Nikita Zadarov on the blue line has been effective in his first season as a top-pairing guy. Tyson Barrie has the points but not the possession numbers he’s put up in the past.

And they stop the puck. At even-strength, this team has the fifth-best save percentage as both Varlamov and Jonathan Bernier have been excellent this season. Their overall numbers of .913 and .914 aren’t exactly inspiring, but they’ve combined for a ,925 adjusted at evens for the Avs. You’ll win a lot of games that way.

For the Hawks… I mean I don’t know that it matters anymore but it will be interesting to watch Keith and Murphy have the last change and get thrown out there against MacKinnon every shift so we can see how Murphy deals with that. He’s certainly looked ok in the role in the two games in Southern California. Other than that, I don’t really know what to tell you. More of Eddie O telling us how much they like Matthew Highmore and Pat Foley slowly turning into Caray and Piersall circa ’79? I’m not sure any of you hate this team more than Foley does right now.

Could be an ugly week for the Hawks. Then again they pretty much all have been since January. They face two teams scrapping for wild card spots in Colorado and Carolina, and then a home-and-home with somehow the second best team in the league in the Bruins. So that’s a good time for everyone.

Eat Arby’s.

 

Game #67 Preview

Preview

Spotlight

Douchebag Du Jour

I Make A Lot Of Graphs

Lineups & How Teams Were Built

Everything Else

Your Friends And Neighbors – ’17-’18 NHL Team Previews: I Don’t Mind The Sun Sometimes, The Image As It Shows

By 1639

For Hawks fans my age, the Colorado Avalanche probably has an outsized presence in our psyches. It’s the scars from having them parachute that unholy team into the conference from Quebec at a time when the Hawks were probably icing their best team in a decade. And while we knew the Hawks couldn’t hang with the Wings, there was always a puncher’s chance in a series (1992 wasn’t that long ago then). But once the Avs showed up, we knew the Hawks were doomed. They couldn’t get through both, and promptly didn’t get through either.

Those two Cups the Avs managed in ’96 and ’01 seemingly have given them an outsized presence on the national stage, too. Because the Avs haven’t mattered in a very long time. In the past 10 years, they have the same amount of playoffs berths as the Panthers. They’ve won less rounds than the Coyotes. They haven’t won a game beyond the first round in 13 years. If it wasn’t for the Varlamov-inspired, PDO-from-hell season of ’13-’14, the Avs would be embarking on their eighth-straight playoff-less season. But we don’t put them in the same category as the Arizonas and Floridas of the world. Flags fly forever, I suppose.

Anyway, let’s get into this muck.

Colorado Avalanche

’16-’17 Record: 22-56-4  48 points  (dead ass last everywhere)

Team Stats 5v5: 48.5 CF% (23rd)  46.6 SF% (28th)  48.0 SCF% (26th)  6.2 SH% (29th)  90.6 SV% (30th)

Special Teams: 12.5 PP% (30th)  76.6 PK% (29th)

Everything Else

So Long, Dummy (Apologies To Desipio)

By 1501

Well, this isn’t good news for the Central Division.

Today Patrick Roy, the anchor that had been holding out, when not outright destroying, at least a decently talented Avalanche squad, resigned as coach as half-GM or whatever it was they labeled him. I’d like to think he lost a power struggle with Joe Sakic, mostly because Sakic might have one clue where St. Patrick didn’t have any.

What this means for this year of course hinges on who the Avs hire and what he does. The Avs aren’t loaded or anything, but this isn’t a completely helpless roster either. It comes with pretty good center depth if Matt Duchene is moved back to center, which he obviously should be. MacKinnon-Dutch-Soderberg-Grigorenko is not the worst start.

Everything Else

Monday Bits And Bobs

By 1451

We’ve reached the Space Madness portion of the offseason, so you’ll have to excuse us if the posts get even more sparse around here. We’re all waiting for the Hawks to sign some forward still sitting on the shelves, and they’re probably waiting until the 15th when Jimmy Vesey goes free agent and see if they can get him. While I’m not sold, he probably comes cheaper than those who are still waiting and could be effective. I’m sorry if we won’t be doing posts about whatever Hawk put his fucking house up for sale. Because who gives a shit, really?

Anyway, some news today elsewhere:

Everything Else

Legalize It – Hawks at Avalanche Preview, Ski Patrol Training

By 1468

evil empire at simpsons avalanche rocket house

Game Time: 8:00PM Central
TV/Radio: CSN, WGN-AM 720
Summit County Mountain Retreats: Mile High Hockey

Now that the league and all of its fans are done treating a 6’8″, 265 lb., 33 year old man with a mechanical engineering degree that he can’t wait to remind everyone he has and has punched people in the face for a living for going on the last decade (and has conservatively made $4.25 million dollars doing so) as they would a Make-A-Wish Foundation child, the games that matter can now resume. But because of more fun with the NHL rule book the Hawks are now without Jonathan Toews tonight because he had the good fortune to be sick and not have to show up for the farce in Nashville.

Everything Else

Once More Unto The Breach – Over The Mountain

By 1314 0

Anyone who expected the Avalanche to win the inaugural season of the newly aligned Central Division at this time last year is a damned dirty liar. Yet the Avs bested both the Hawks and Blues down the stretch only to be hilariously eliminated in the first round, in overtime of game 7 at home versus the Wild. Again.

Now the Avs will look to build on the success of last year with their young core despite losing their most defensively responsible center within the division, being on the ass-end of what is bound to be a hellacious numeric regression, and being run by two morons, one of whom is an ill-tempered dickwad behind the bench.