Jared Bednar believes his Colorado Avalanche finished Saturday's 8-2 defeat to the St. Louis Blues with an unprecedented lackluster effort.
"(Our) third period was a joke," Bednar said postgame. "That was the worst period of hockey I've ever seen from our club."
He added: "The third period (was) unacceptable, unexplainable. That's why it's a blowout. We stopped playing. (It) looked like we couldn't make it past 10 feet in the third period, giving up odd-man rushes every five seconds. Every rush attack they had ended up in a scoring chance against (us).
"Not good enough. It's just guys quitting and not doing what they're supposed to be doing. Feeling sorry for themselves."
The Blues led 4-1 through 40 minutes and scored four straight in the final frame, including a pair in a span of 1:29 early in the period. St. Louis outshot Colorado 19-14 in the third while controlling 72.86% of the expected goals, according to Natural Stat Trick.
The Avalanche had 79.54% of the expected goals in the second period when they outshot the Blues 11-6. But Colorado failed to dig out of a 3-0 deficit, matching St. Louis' one goal in the middle stanza before the wheels fell off for the hosts in the third. Brayden Schenn and Pavel Buchnevich both produced hat tricks for the victors.
Bednar has coached the Avalanche since 2016-17. They went 22-56-4 in his first season, finishing with only 48 points in the standings - the worst total of the salary cap era.
Colorado fell to 8-5-0 with Saturday's loss. The Avalanche occupy second place in the Central Division in spite of goaltender Alexandar Georgiev's .887 save percentage and a team goal differential of zero that enters Sunday tied for 17th in the league. The club's power play ranks 22nd despite boasting the likes of Nathan MacKinnon, Mikko Rantanen, and Cale Makar.
The Avalanche will travel to face the Seattle Kraken on Monday night.
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