DENVER _ The mission, as Cory Schneider called it, is to be a key component toward helping the Devils once again be a perennial contender.
That obviously won't happen this season as the Devils lost a season-high ninth straight, 3-2, to the NHL-worst Avalanche on Thursday night at Pepsi Center and are all but mathematically eliminated from the playoffs for a fifth straight year.
This one was a heartbreaker as defenseman Francois Beauchemin beat Schneider to the short side from the left circle at 18:46 of the third period for the winner.
Schneider made 19 saves for the Devils (25-30-12), in an 0-7-2 skid. Calvin Pickard made 25 saves for the Avalanche (19-44-3).
Earlier, Schneider, who turns 31 on March 18, told The Record he has no reason to believe he won't be part of the rebuilding Devils' future efforts to return to the postseason.
"That was the mission, that was the goal," said Schneider, acquired from the Canucks for a first-round pick on June 30, 2013 and in the second season of a seven-year, $42 million deal that includes a no-trade clause. "I came from very successful years in Vancouver. The success we had was tough to match. When you're early in your career, that's all you expect.
"You understand the situation is different but it doesn't take it out of you," Schneider added. "That feeling, the playoff feeling, it's the best feeling there is. I made a commitment here because I felt this team had a good, long-range plan and future and I still believe that. I'm a guy who wants to be part of the solution."
Still, though Schneider is still in the midst of his prime playing seasons, he does recognize a career's finite nature.
So he knows with each passing playoff-less season, it's one less chance to win the elusive Cup. "As you get older, you start to think more about your mortality as a hockey player," Schneider said. "It's not forever. When you're young and you're winning, it seems like it's going to last forever. I'm not looking at the end of the road by any means, I feel like I've got a lot of good hockey in me. But it's something you have to think about and, at the end of the year, see what the team has to say, too."
Devils general manager Ray Shero has never indicated he would consider trying to trade Schneider, a first-time All-Star last season, and coach John Hynes on Thursday stressed the goalie's importance to the organization.
"Cory is one of the best in the game," Hynes said. "He's a high-character guy. He's the type of person we want to have in the organization moving forward."
But things can change rapidly in the offseason.
"It's not just what the player wants," said Schneider, a Marblehead, Mass. native comfortable with his family in New Jersey. "It's what the team wants as well. I've had no indication from anybody that I'm not a part of the solution here. That's a conversation you can have at the end of the year."
Schneider stopped all 10 shots he faced in the first period, keeping the game scoreless with 11 seconds remaining as he stretched out and got his stick on Gabriel Landeskog's sharp-angle try from the left.
Pickard then stopped all 13 shots he faced in the second period and the Avalanche scored on one of their two shots as Nathan MacKinnon's slap from the right boards deflected in off the inside of Schneider's right pad for a 1-0 lead at 11:11.
But Taylor Hall, with his first goal in nine games, tied it 42 seconds into the third period, knocking in the rebound of Ben Lovejoy's slap shot. That snapped the Devils' goal-less drought at 174:51.
The teams traded goals again as Rene Bourque, from the slot, had his shot deflect up and over Schneider off Devils defenseman Dalton Prout at 4:05 before Stefan Noesen tied it at 2 at 6:13.
