At the start of the season, the Avalanche were leaving points on the table thanks to some late goals by the wrong team. The first two games of the season saw the Avalanche give up the winning goal with less than three minutes to play in the game, wiping out at least one point. Through the November 5th debacle against Chicago, the Avalanche had scored just 1 of the 5 goals scored with under three minutes in a game. That 1 goal was scored by Tyler Arnason to ice a 4-2 win against the Blue Jackets on October 30th. The other 4 goals were scored by Boston, Edmonton, San Jose and Chicago.
And then, on November 15th, Darcy Tucker scored that dramatic tying goal on a distracted Dwayne Roloson with just 11 seconds left. The Avalanche would go on to win in the shootout, turning zero points into two points as if that had been the game plan all along. Two nights later, they regressed a bit and gave up two late goals to the Flames. But, with dramatic late-game heroics in back-to-back games (Dallas on Friday and Vancouver on Sunday), the Avalanche are suddenly the team stealing points in late games. After losing those two free points at the start of the year, the Avalanche have netted five "bonus" points in the last 12 games.
Now you know why the team is coming out so flat at the start of their games; they are just saving it for the only part of the game that matters - the final three minutes.