The defending Stanley Cup champions started the 2023 playoffs with a setback.

The Colorado Avalanche fell 3-1 at home to the Seattle Kraken in Game 1 of the Western Conference first-round series on Tuesday.

Seattle made a statement early in each of the three periods. The Kraken scored a goal in every period, each time in the first five minutes.

Colorado saw its chances after each of these goals. By the time the buzzer sounded, the Avalanche outshot the Kraken 35-30 — but they had two fewer goals to show for it.

“We had plenty of looks, but we were just disconnected,” Avs forward Nathan MacKinnon said. “It wasn’t our best execution. I thought we shot ourselves in the foot a lot of times — that was just the night.”

Head coach Jared Bednar echoed the words of his team captain.

“That was probably the first thing that stood out to me,” Bednar said. “I liked some of the intensity that we played with at times … but they came up with more pucks.”

The Game 1 loss is costly.

Colorado has one more game at Ball Arena before heading to Seattle for back-to-back games on the road. Needless to say, the Avs are in a hole and will need to climb out of it.

But the team doesn’t see Tuesday’s defeat as something to dwell on.

“I think the maturity in our group … that game is now behind us,” Avs defenseman Bowen Byram said. “There’s no changing it. All of our focus will be on Thursday night and getting the win.”

Defenseman Cale Makar added, “It’s one game. We move on and we learn from it.”

Bednar ultimately agrees with Byram and Makar. The Avs showed the ability to overcome adversity in last year’s Stanley Cup run, as well as throughout the 2022-23 season.

But the coach also knows his team will need to execute better in Thursday’s Game 2 to even the series.

“I don’t expect our team to break down after something like that,” Bednar said. “We have to come back and be better than we were tonight. You have to expect to play your best hockey if you want to win. We’ll have to be much better for Game 2.”