Avalanche coach Jared Bednar tried to draw a smiley face on his team’s biggest loss of this NHL season.

“I’m not going to judge (the) team on results only. I think that’s a losing battle … You play like that and good things will happen,” Bednar said Wednesday, after Colorado outplayed Dallas for 65 minutes of hockey but found a way to lose 2-1 in a shootout to a team that has given Colorado nothing but misery.

Don’t worry, be happy? Orange slices for everybody?

Get that weak sauce out of here.

Trusting the process is the euphemism employed by a hockey team that suddenly finds itself searching for answers.

It’s one battle after another for the Avs now. They find themselves only two points ahead of the Stars in the Central Division standings.

The only thing that Bednar found hard to swallow about his loss was that his team was not rewarded for a top-shelf effort.

Even at their best, there’s no guarantee the Avalanche are a better hockey club than Dallas.

With 15 games remaining on the schedule, the regular season has ceased to be a carefree celebration of Colorado’s greatness.

The Avs must expend serious energy for the next month to fend off Dallas for the division title if they want to avoid the bumpiest road imaginable to the Stanley Cup.

After Nathan MacKinnon groused earlier this week about everything from lack of rhythm in the Avalanche’s game to the way coach Jared Bednar manages his lineup, we’re forced to contemplate an uncomfortable question: Whose team is it anyway? Does the coach call the shots around here? Or does MacKinnon?

And maybe the most pressing concern of all? Bednar must decide whether to place his trust in Scott Wedgewood or Mackenzie Blackwood as his goalie when the heat gets turned to blast in the playoffs.

Wedgewood is “the guy to go with right now,” Bednar said before the Avalanche took the ice against Dallas in Ball Arena, where fans whose hearts are deep in the heart of Texas shouted “Stars!” at every opportunity during the pregame rendition of the national anthem.

A month is plenty of time for Blackwood to reclaim his mojo. But does Bednar play off a slumping goalie’s psyche when every game matters in the standings?

Colorado can win the Cup with either of these guys between the pipes. The last distraction any team needs in the postseason, however, is those nagging goalie controversy questions after any tough loss.

The Avs outshot Dallas 34-18 through overtime. Defenseman Cale Makar scored his 20th goal of the season on a beauty of a shot from the slot in the first period. The Colorado blue line was stout, blocking shots and forcing the Stars to work on the perimeter.

But it wasn’t enough.

Notice a pattern here? Dallas has a way of messing with the noggins of guys wearing burgundy and blue.

Yes, Colorado played this game without captain Gabe Landeskog and Artturi Lehkonen, both nursing injuries.

But with key players Mikko Rantanen and Roope Hintz both rehabbing injuries of their own, Dallas won the game when Wyatt Johnston scored the lone goal of the shootout.

All three matchups so far this season have been decided in a shootout.

But when push comes to shove, Dallas captain Jamie Benn goes low and Stars goaltender Jake Oettinger stands tall.

“We’ve got to get to Oettinger more. I feel like all three games we’ve outshot them heavily and outplayed them,” MacKinnon said. “We’ve just got to find a way to beat that guy.”

One way or another, the Avs and Stars are on a collision course in the second round of the playoffs. And one of the two best teams in the league will be eliminated from Cup contention by the middle of May.

Is that fair?

No.

But what does fairness have to do with it?

The Stars have a way of winning the mind games with Colorado.

That mental block is the biggest roadblock between the Avalanche and the Cup.