It was not a perfect game but it was an improvement from the Avalanche's past few games to earn two points against a division rival.
It was not a perfect game but it was an improvement from the Avalanche's past few games to earn two points against a division rival.
There were a lot of factors for and against the Colorado Avalanche coming into the Central Division matchup with the Dallas Stars, but they made few mistakes and fought hard for a win.
"Checked a bunch of boxes when it comes to our competitiveness and the hard defending was good. We tried to get above pucks," head coach Jared Bednar said. "Most of the scoring chances, I think we had some turnovers, lack of execution especially early and a little bit into the second but we defended hard. We're committed to our defending game. Won the special teams battle, goaltender was fantastic — I mean you check those three boxes for our team, it usually leads to success so there's there's a lot to like there for sure."
The Avs were able to move past a tough loss to the Toronto Maple Leafs and get an especially important win for the team's confidence. The team's fourth line got two goals — Joel Kiviranta and Andrew Cogliano, respectively — which displayed the depth and commitment of the team as a whole.
"They were on a back-to-back, we wanted to take advantage of it as much as we could. They had a pretty good first period but they scored first. We were able to respond pretty quickly and then all parts of the game were good tonight — defensively, seemed really strong in our end on the cycle and limiting chances to the middle of the ice and PK (penalty kill) two big kills, power play gets one."
The PK has been an issue for the Avalanche in the last few games but the team only ended up in the box twice for two minors. The PK unit stepped up and kept the Stars from capitalizing on the man advantage.
"I guess nice when we don't take too many (penalties). Obviously you want more power plays if you can, but penalty kill did a good job of stepping up today and trying to you know, reset that part of our game as well," Devon Toews said.
The Avs' top line each notched a goal — Mikko Rantanen, Nathan MacKinnon and Artturi Lehkonen, respectively — with Lehkonen's goal coming on the power play.
Alexandar Georgiev stopped 33 shots and Bednar said it was one of his best games in a while. The team defended well but Georgiev made some big saves which helped keep the lead and win the game.
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