Avalanche has found steadier waters, but Colorado’s ultimate ceiling still a mystery

Jared Bednar won’t go very long without thinking about his hockey team or his various outdoor-related passions.

It certainly shouldn’t be surprising when he finds a way to tie the two together. The Colorado Avalanche reached the midseason point on a turbulent 2024-25 campaign Tuesday night.

His way of describing this season to date isn’t that different from other years. How the Avs got to this point certainly has been.

“I say this all the time. It’s like a boat,” Avs coach Jared Bednar said. “One thing’s broken, you plug the hole and another hole pops up someplace else. You’re constantly working on every aspect of your game. Something will give you trouble and you pay attention to that for three, four, five days and then something else pops up.”

To borrow from Bednar’s nautical theme then, the S.S. Avalanche has spent some time in rough seas this season. There were days when the vessel had too many holes and not enough able to hands to patch them.

And even after the ship has been steadied, it’s still hard to find Colorado’s place among the NHL’s top threats to win the Stanley Cup.

Who are the Avs, really? It still might be too soon to tell.

“You’re just trying to maximize what you can get out of the group you’ve got,” Bednar said.

Availability has been one of the club’s top challenges this season. Removing captain Gabe Landeskog from the equation — though his status will likely become a bigger part of the 2024-25 story in the coming weeks — the Avs have had their top-10 offensive players together for 36 minutes.

The “Big Three” superstars — Nathan MacKinnon, Cale Makar and Mikko Rantanen — have played every game. The two new goaltenders, Mackenzie Blackwood and Scott Wedgewood, have turned the other biggest weakness into a strength, but the injury bug has already claimed Wedgewood for at least a couple of weeks.

Just give the Avs the three world-class offensive talents, a couple of high-end pals and strong goaltending, and that’s enough to make Colorado a threat in the Stanley Cup Playoffs. Whether or not they can be one of the favorites to win it all come April, or just a dangerous out, is dependent on the rest of the lineup.

The Avs got off to a rough start, not just in net but the defending in front of the goalies as well. That part improved, but the save percentages did not which led to the two trades.

Colorado’s underlying defensive numbers are actually a bit worse over the past month since the new goalies arrived, but there are a couple of games in a small sample outweighing otherwise solid work. And the goaltenders have done their part, independent of the play in front of them.

“I think in this last couple of weeks, we’ve been playing really well,” Makar said. “I think there’s still things that we can clean up. We’re not going to be perfect in the middle of the season, but I think especially with guys going in and out of the lineup and still finding ways to win is pretty good.”

There could still be work done on the fringes of the roster, but this is where Landeskog’s future comes into play. He has skated a couple of times with the team in the past week, which is an uptick from before but likely far from anything approaching a return date.

Whether or not he can (or will) play in a regular-season game this season has a dramatic impact on what the Avalanche can or cannot do with the roster, particularly before the trade deadline. And injuries have made it hard to assess whether or not even minor upgrades are needed.

Would a completely healthy version of the Avs be one of, if not, the best team in the NHL? Maybe.

Could Colorado finally get the band together in time for the playoffs but end up like Vegas last season — a potential threat that couldn’t get out of the starting blocks? Also possible.

For now, the Avs remain a work in progress. One with a higher floor if Blackwood continues to play well, but the ceiling remains a mystery.

“We still want to get better, line by line, player by player and as a full team,” Bednar said. “Doing what we want to do better and more consistently as the year goes on to set ourselves up for the playoffs.”

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