What Went Wrong in Avs’ Shocking Early Postseason End?

In the aftermath of the Avalanche’s unexpected early Stanley Cup Playoff exit, everyone wants to know what went wrong. That’s exactly what I asked the president of hockey operations, Joe Sakic, at the organization’s exit interviews on Tuesday.

“I went through as a player as well. Sometimes things just aren’t going to go your way. I look at Cale (Makar). Like Cale played so well. He had as many chances in the playoffs as he did in the regular season on a per-game thing,” Sakic said. “It might have gotten blocked, great saves, just missing the net at times. Those things happen, but it doesn’t mean you don’t play well. Sometimes it is just not going your way. And it was bad timing for some guys. We just missed on some opportunities and we didn’t capitalize.”

The Avalanche’s former franchise forward said the most challenging aspect of the untimely ending was that management genuinely believed it had a strong contender. The numerous moves made during the season, including trading Mikko Rantanen more than a month before the trade deadline for Martin Necas, were to shore up a team to go deep into the postseason.

5 Takeaways: Sakic, MacFarland Discuss Disappointing End To Season

“It stings right now. Next year is going to come here and we’re going to have another competitive team that’s going to have the same goal in mind and try to win. Everybody’s frustrated. Everybody’s disappointed, just because we felt we were this close to moving on,” Sakic said.

Rantanen played a big part in knocking the Avs out in the first round. Several reporters asked GM Chris MacFarland and Sakic about trading him to the Carolina Hurricanes and how he ended up back in the Central Division.

“We heard after the fact he wasn’t planning on signing an extension with Carolina, that there was a possibility (he could move again). But … no. This stings not because Mikko was on the other side. It stings because we felt we were close. We did those deals because it was wide open, a lot of really good teams, equal teams. (We) wanted to put ourselves in a position to be one of those teams that had a legit shot to win the Stanley Cup,” Sakic said.

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Coming so close but failing to get past the first round raises several questions about what needs improvement. Management will need to make decisions on a few unrestricted free agents, including Brock Nelson, Jonathan Drouin, Joel Kiviranta, Jimmy Vesey, Ryan Lindgren, and Erik Johnson.

“We’ll look at our cap space, and we’ll look at our internal free agents and the external free agents, and see where the holes are, and see if the math works, and find out where we can improve the team. Our goal is always to improve the team next year …,” MacFarland said. “And we’ve got a lot of players that are coming back here, that are obviously good hockey players. So that’s for the next few months here to dial that in for sure.”

A positive from the short-lived playoff run was the return of the team’s captain, Gabriel Landeskog. Aside from that, the front office will have to find a new assistant coach to help the power play after firing Ray Bennett. They will have to face the same conundrum as it has in the last few seasons — who will be the No. 2 center? What other moves need to be made so they don’t just come close again? We’ll see what happens in the offseason.