Getty Alexandar Georgiev allowed 7 goals in Game 1.
Jared Bednar, the head coach of the Colorado Avalanche, has called out his goalie Alexandar Georgiev after their 7-6 loss to the Winnipeg Jets in Game 1 on April 21.
Colorado scored the opening goal of the game, and after Winnipeg scored two straight, the Avs scored twice in less than 20 seconds to take a 3-2 lead, but the Jets answered as the game was 3-3 after the first period.
The Avalanche couldn’t get timely stops from Georgiev who allowed seven goals. The goaltender recorded just 16 saves for a .696 save percentage, and Bednar says his goalie needs to do better if they are going to win games.
“(Georgiev) probably needed to be better, right? thought we played well, we created some chances. He made some good saves, but we’re (going to) need like a couple more saves than that probably to win, you know? But it is what it is. We’ll regroup. We made some mistakes in front of him that we’ll have to clean up and try to get the job done. It’s a team game,” Bednar said following Colorado’s 7-6 loss on April 21.
Georgiev has had his struggles all season, as he finished the year with a 3.02 GAA and a .897 save percentage. But, Bednar had no choice but to start Georgiev in Game 1, as Colorado’s other goalie, Justus Annunen was out with an illness.
Winnipeg, meanwhile, was pleased with their goaltender Connor Hellrbuyck, despite allowing 6 goals.
“You’re not tagging any of those goals on (Hellebuyck). Some of them had seeing eyes, some of them were bouncing all over the place, some of them were just dead giveaways on our part. You’re not hanging any of those on him. It could have been worse. Seriously,” Bowness said post-game. “We don’t give up that many chances. We don’t give up that many shots. And Connor had to play better, and he made a lot of big saves at the right time, which he always does. I’m not hanging any of those goals on him.”
With Game 2 set for April 23 at 9:30 p.m. ET., Bednar won’t reveal if Annunen will be healthy enough to start or if Georgiev will be playing again.
“I’m not going to speculate,” Bednar said when asked if Annunen would be healthy enough to start Game 2.
Jared Bednar Believes Avalanche Made ‘Too Many’ Mistakes
Although Georgiev only made 16 saves on 23 shots, Bednar thinks Colorado made too many mistakes to get the win anyway.
However, the Avalanche head coach is pleased with certain things his team did, which they can build off in the series.
“We played extremely hard. We did a lot of good things. You don’t get six (goals) on the Jets without doing that. We also made some mistakes that they capitalized on. Too many, obviously tonight, and it ends up costing us the hockey game.”
Colorado’s top players did show up in the loss, as Cale Makar recorded 3 points, while Mikko Rantanen, Nathan MacKinnon, and Artturi Lehkonen all had 2 points.
Avalanche-Jets Playoff Schedule
Game 2 of the Avalanche-Jets playoff series goes down on April 23, as the full schedule is a follows:
- Game 1: Sunday, April 21 – Winnipeg 7, Colorado 6.
- Game 2: Tuesday, April 23 – Colorado at Winnipeg — 9:30 p.m. Eastern time
- Game 3: Friday, April 26 – Winnipeg at Colorado — 10:00 p.m. Eastern time
- Game 4: Sunday, April 28 – Winnipeg at Colorado — 2:30 p.m. Eastern time
- Game 5 (if necessary): Tuesday, April 30 – Colorado at Winnipeg — TBD
- Game 6 (if necessary): Thursday, May 2 – Winnipeg at Colorado — TBD
- Game 7 (if necessary): Saturday, May 4 – Colorado at Winnipeg — TBD