Alexandar Georgiev has had hot hands the last three games, earning him a fourth straight start in net. The Avalanche’s goaltending battle has dissipated with Kaapo Kahkonen’s departure and head coach Jared Bednar’s confidence in Georgiev.
“When we picked Kaapo up, our goalies weren’t playing that good. And seemed like, shortly after he got here, we tried to give him a good opportunity to play the game, and then our goalies went in, and I think both of them have been really strong over the last handful of games each,” Bednar said. “We can’t keep three, and we didn’t get a great look at him — there’s only one game and two in the minors but the guys that we originally had here stepped up and played really well, so that’s the decision.”
The 28-year-old netminder had a rough start to the season with five losses in nine starts and a goals against average of 3.76. He has won two of his last three starts and only allowed one goal in the loss to the Winnipeg Jets.
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“He’s been great for us. We knew he’d bounce back in this type of way. I think the goaltending we’ve got from Juice (Justus Annunen), and then the last little stretch here has been great,” Logan O’Connor said. “They’re giving us an opportunity to win every single night. So it’s awesome to see the resilience from both those guys.”
Bednar said earlier in the season that he chose his goaltender the day before or the day of, depending on how they looked. He defended his starting goaltender from the get-go and said it took time but he has improved his game and gained his confidence.
“I didn’t have any doubt that he could get there. He just wanted to get there as soon as possible, right? And same thing with Annunen and again Annunen’s a guy that hasn’t played a ton of games for us over the course of the last three years. He’s still a guy that has to prove himself,” Bednar said. “When you’re stringing together solid games and giving our team a chance to win, that’s what we want to see. The longer you do that, the more trust you get, and the more my confidence is going to be rising. Our recent past here now, I’ve liked our goaltending, and I think our team’s getting the results, largely in part because those guys have really elevated their games.”
Georgiev allowed six goals in his last two wins but faced a total of 61 shots and made some key saves to keep the Avs competitive. Bednar said he would continue playing the hot goalie, and right now, it’s the Russian from Bulgaria.
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