The Colorado Avalanche are just too darn fancy

Maybe it’s that the Minnesota Wild just have their number, and the Colorado Avalanche have had the misfortune of facing them twice to start the season.

Maybe it’s two games, no big deal, nothing to see here.

But the fact is that the Colorado Avalanche are the only team in the NHL yet to score a goal, let alone win a game. And the message from the dressing room is clear: They’re being a bunch of fancy pantses.

From Coach Patrick Roy after their 5-0 opening game embarrassment:

“The way we’re playing, I mean offensively, I mean, hey, we were hiding behind it in the pre-season. Now we can’t hide it anymore. We’re going to have to compete. We’re going to have to go to the net, we’re going to have to change our little game.”

From Gabriel Landeskog after their 3-0 loss on Saturday night:

"I don't think we're paying the price enough," Landeskog said. "We're being too fancy. It's little details."

The Avs were outshot 40-14 at even strength in the first game against the Wild. They cut that down in the second loss, outshooting the Wild 19-18 at 5-on-5.

"Five on five, we were the best team on the ice," Roy told the Denver Post after Saturday’s loss. "If we play like this, I'm not worried.

"If we continue to work like we did tonight, we will start scoring goals. We'll be fine. I know the name of the game is winning hockey games. But we did so many things well tonight. Our confidence should grow."

There’s no doubt this team can score, and can figure it out. But this slump is part of a larger trend that extends back to the preseason, where they had 10 goals in eight games.

Did they think this was going to come easy?

But hey, they won the Corsi battle last night, so there’s that…