No excuses.
The Avalanche will miss the playoffs for the second year in a row, a well-deserved outcome for a team that had plenty of opportunities down the stretch to move ahead of Minnesota for the second wild card in the Western Conference.
And failed at every turn.
You lose four games in a row -- they were competitive in one of them, Tuesday's 4-3 loss in Nashville -- and six of seven with a playoff position on the line, and the end result is inevitable.
Coach
Patrick Roy was interviewed Wednesday morning on his weekly Denver radio show on
104.3 The Fan.
Here is the
ROY INTERVIEW.
The Wild have lost four in a row, too, but they did what they had to do -- grabbing nine of a possible 10 points in head-to-head meetings against the Avalanche -- to build a lead that turned out to be more than enough to get them into the postseason again.
You'd think, with a 6-on-4 skating advantage for the final 1:57 of regulation Tuesday, the Avalanche would have found a way to force overtime and gain at minimum the one point needed to keep their playoff hopes alive.
Then again, this isn't 2013-14, when everything seemed to go their way, when they always managed to come up with a last-minute goal to get to overtime and pull out a win.
This Avalanche team, which still hasn't scored a 5-on-3 goal 80 games into the season, have gone to an overtime/shootout in just 10 games, losing four. The Wild have 11 overtime losses, seven more points right there.
The Avalanche have lost six times in regulation when leading after two periods -- 12 points squandered -- and will take a 17-19-4 home record into Saturday's season finale against Anaheim. Overall, they're 12-15-1 since the NHL All-Star break.
The reasons for their failure to make the playoffs again have been well-documented: lousy puck possession, awful defensive play, couldn't score the big goal, too many bad penalties, inconsistent goaltending, poor home record and third-period collapses.
And, yes, Roy and his staff need to be held accountable as well. He's said as much. I have no doubt he'll return for his fourth season; GM
Joe Sakic isn't going to let him go, and Roy is determined to get this franchise back to where it should be, and that doesn't mean merely getting into the playoffs with 15 other teams.
I'm not savvy enough to analyze Roy's coaching chops, and I'm not going to attempt to do that here. But as far as the "structure" that he and his players often mention, it obviously hasn't been successful, at least not with the current personnel.
There will be changes in the offseason, which is always the case but especially after a team fails to make the playoffs. There will be plenty of time to discuss all of that in the coming days.
Colorado Avalanche Blogger •Avalanche Insider • 
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