The Colorado Avalanche bounced back from consecutive losses to beat the St. Louis Blues 4-1 at Ball Arena on Wednesday night.
Ross Colton scored his first actual goal and Ivan Prosvetov earned his first win with the Colorado Avalanche in the 4-1 final against the St. Louis Blues.
Colton grabbed a pass from Miles Wood and wristed the puck past Blues goaltender Jordan Binnington at 8:53 in the first period. The assist was Wood's first point on the season.
"I'd be lying if I said we weren't putting a little bit of pressure on ourselves," Colton said after the win. "Obviously we want to come in and help the team as much as we can in different ways and producing is part of that. It's nice to get that one and hopefully they keep coming."
Avalanche players' moms were in attendance and Colton said it was his first. He thinks his mom was his good luck charm and said she'll have to be at many more of his games.
Mikko Rantanen notched his sixth goal of the season on the power play at 13:19 into the first. After the game, he said the win was especially important at Ball Arena following two consecutive road losses.
"You really want to bounce back as soon as you can and what better way to do it than at home," Rantanen said. "We want to establish the home advantage and try to use it moving forward."
Robert Thomas scored the only goal for the Blues at 17:49 in the second period and Binnington made 24 saves on the night.
Prosvetov made 27 saves and said the home crowd made a difference in his game.
"The crowd here — it's really loud here," the 24-year-old Russian goaltender said. "I'm used to playing smaller buildings so that definitely bumps your energy up and your confidence for sure."
Artturi Lehkonen snagged a pass in front of Binnington and slid it past him less than two minutes into the third period to put the Avalanche up 3-1.
The final goal of the night came from Bowen Byram — his second of the season in his 100th game — on a picture-perfect pass from Nathan MacKinnon.
Head coach Jared Bednar moved Logan O'Connor to the third line with Wood and Colton and said he thinks he really helped that line. O'Connor said after morning skate that he wanted to provide more leadership to the new guys on his line.
"OC (O'Connor) helped that line in a lot of ways. Maybe the meetings we had over the last couple days just freed him up to go play a little bit and relax knowing it will come eventually," Bednar said. "But they had a great start to the game, obviously they score, but they had multiple opportunities to bag a couple other goals."
The win was especially important for the Avalanche's confidence and mental aspect of their game as they face off against the reigning Stanley Cup champion Vegas Golden Knights on Saturday.