Colorado lost all three games against Winnipeg in the regular season but has studied their first-round opponent ahead of the series start.

The Avalanche went 0-3 versus the Winnipeg Jets in the regular season but have done homework on their opponent for the first round of the Stanley Cup Playoffs. 

"I think we're always looking at our blueprint games and how we need to play and then you have to make it work against the opponent," head coach Jared Bednar said after practice on Saturday. "There's teams that had great success against the Jets this year. So we looked at how they played against them, some of the things that they did — key points of analytics that we want to look at and then video supporting of that."

The Jets were the No. 1 team in the league for 5-on-5 goals for/against ratio with 1.48 but the Avs led in highest goals-per-game average (3.68) and overall (302). 

"I mean we scored the most goals in the league this year. So it's going to be tough to score but I think for us it's our defensive details we need to be strong at," Nathan MacKinnon said. "They have so many weapons, they're a very deep team. It's just about making the plays on the ice. They're so quick, video helps but once you're out there, seems like all of it's gone and you have to make reads quickly. It's going to be really tough, for sure."

The Avalanche did not play their best hockey against the Jets in the regular season. Bednar said Winnipeg has yet to see what his team has shown it's capable of in other games this season. 

"My whole belief on it is if we would've been 3-0 against the Jets and finished first overall in the whole league I'd feel no better about going into this series than I do now. I know we're a good team, they're a good team." Bednar said after an optional morning skate at Canada Life Centre. "I've learned this over my eight years in the league it's about playing your best hockey, at the right time, which is now."

While the Jets are in the lower half of the league's rankings for power play and penalty kill, special teams are important for the Avalanche to be sharp. 

"I think you try to study the other team more obviously than playing in the regular season. You play so many games, every game is different, the opponent so now you might play same team seven times so I think you do more studying on how they play," Mikko Rantanen said. "Probably for me, studying their penalty kill — you know special teams are a big part of hockey if you want to be successful. So more studying for sure."

Second-line center Casey Mittelstadt said his focus is on finding the Jets' weaknesses and figuring out how to capitalize on those while balancing playing to his own strengths. 

The Avs have not started a playoff series on the road since 2019 and were more successful at home than away this season. 

Projected lineup

With the loss of Jonathan Drouin to a lower-body injury, it is difficult to determine what the lines will be but here's what NHL.com posted.

Zach Parise — Nathan MacKinnon — Mikko Rantanen
Artturi Lehkonen — Casey Mittelstadt — Valeri Nichushkin
Miles Wood — Ross Colton — Joel Kiviranta
Andrew Cogliano — Yakov Trenin — Brandon Duhaime

Devon Toews — Cale Makar
Samuel Girard — Josh Manson
Jack Johnson — Sean Walker

Alexandar Georgiev
Justus Annunen

The puck drops at 5 p.m. MT. 

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