This is the kind of Avalanche game you probably worry about: facing a winless Columbus Blue Jackets team that should be a lot better and just made a coaching change, replacing Todd Richards with John Tortorella.
Here are the game notes for Saturday night's game.
The Blue Jackets (0-8-0) are coming off a 3-2 loss in Minnesota on Thursday in Tortorella's first game since replacing Richards. They played pretty well, had a 2-1 lead and outshot the Wild 29-23.
The Avalanche (2-3-1) are coming off a 1-0 overtime loss to Carolina, are 1-2-1 at home this season and leave Monday for a three-game road trip.
"It's an important game for us," Avalanche coach Patrick Roy said Saturday morning. "Three points out of four -- .750 -- it's good for us. If we do that all the time at home we'll have a good home record, but at the same time we're playing against a good team, a team that's probably going to be very desperate."
Semyon Varlamov will be back in goal after stopping 18 of 19 shots against the Hurricanes. He gave up 13 goals in fewer than eight periods in the first three games and sat as Reto Berra's backup for two games last weekend before getting back in the crease Wednesday.
"I was very happy with the way he bounced back," Roy said. "I had no doubt that he was going to bounce back. Sometimes it's good when you don't have the start you want, (have) a couple games on the bench just to reset. Varly's been working extremely hard in the practices and I had no doubt that he would come back with a strong performance.
"I thought he was good and we played well in front of him. There were a couple mistakes here and there, but it was probably one of our best defensive games since I've been in Denver coaching the team. We didn't give much, we were solid in our end, put pressure on the forwards, we tracked really well."
After scoring 10 goals in the first two games, the Avalanche have six goals in the past four games, so they need to get the offense going again.
The Blue Jackets have been outscored 37-15, but goalie Sergei Bobrovsky has a 3-1-1 career record against the Avalanche with a 2.39 goals-against average and .910 save percentage.
Varlamov is 6-3-1 in his career against Columbus with three shutouts, a 1.88 average and .940 save percentage.
The Blue Jackets will be without leading scorer Ryan Johansen (one goal, six assists). He became ill Saturday morning and returned to Columbus on a commercial flight for further evaluation.
Johansen was benched for the final 6:10 of regulation in Minnesota, and a New York Post report said Tortorella wasn't happy with his conditioning.
"That's the first I heard of it," Tortorella said Saturday morning. "I don't think conditioning is a problem."
I asked Tortorella if confidence is as big of a problem as anything the Blue Jackets have done, or not done, on the ice.
"One win, let's just look to get one win and it's amazing what happens to athletes when that happens," he said. "They get to turn the radio on, the music, and all the other good things that come with winning. That kind of grows on you, that's what helps you mentally.
"There's no question it's a pretty fragile team. I like the way they practiced today, they were loose. We were good in our meetings. I think they took a step in the right direction (against Minnesota). We lost the game, but I thought we defended very well. We need to keep the puck out of our net. We did a lot of good things."
*****
Defenseman Brandon Gormley will play his second game in a row after making his Avalanche debut on Wednesday. He played 17:22, had one shot on goal and moved the puck well.
"You have to make the best of any opportunity you get," he said. "I was happy with how I played and you have to build off that and continue that every day, just take one day at a time. I guess I'm happy with how the first game went. It was a good start and I have to keep getting better.
"I have to play well defensively and move the puck around. We have a lot of skilled forwards here and you have to get them the puck and let them make their plays. We had a solid game (defensively)."
Tyson Barrie will finish his three-game suspension Saturday, giving the Avalanche seven healthy defensemen for the upcoming road trip with Brad Stuart out with a back injury.
Here are the projected lineups:
BLUE JACKETS FORWARDS Brandon Saad -- Brandon Dubinsky -- Nick Foligno Scott Hartnell -- Alexander Wenneberg -- Cam Atkinson Boone Jenner -- William Karlson -- Matt Calvert Rene Bourque -- Gregory Campbell -- David Clarkson
DEFENSE Jack Johnson -- David Savard Fedor Tyutin -- Dalton Prout Cody Goloubef -- Ryan Murray
GOALIES Sergei Bobrovsky Curtis McElhinney
AVALANCHE FORWARDS Blake Comeau -- Matt Duchene -- Jarome Iginla Gabriel Landeskog -- Nathan MacKinnon -- Alex Tanguay Dennis Everberg -- Carl Soderberg -- John Mitchell Cody McLeod -- Mikhail Grigorenko -- Jack Skille
DEFENSE Francois Beauchemin -- Erik Johnson Nikita Zadorov -- Nate Guenin Brandon Gormley -- Nick Holden
GOALIES Semyon Varlamov Reto Berra