Injured Avalanche come up short; fall to Nashville 5-2

The waves of streaks continue for a Colorado Avalanche team that has one of the most depleted rosters caused by injury that I can recall in recent NHL history. Last night against a struggling Nashville Predator team that has their own issues, it was minor details that combined for Colorado’s 3rd straight loss after a 5 game winning streak putting Colorado at 5-7-0.

Truthfully the positives once again outweighed negatives in Music City. The bottom line is that the Avalanche are asking certain players to redline while the call ups and line jostling is forcing the rest of the unit to play catchup with no real time to understand what they are catching up to. This is to no fault of anyone from management to coaches to players. It’s just the facts for a team that needs some reinforcements out of the infirmary. The defense has been a high point for Colorado over the course of these first dozen games, and in addition to all the other things, had a minor set back in the absence of Calvin de Haan, who should return Tuesday against Seattle. Tuesday will also most likely mark the return of Artturi Lehkonen and potentially Jonathan Drouin. The Avalanche announced Sunday AM, that Lehkonen was brought off of LTIR and Drouin remains day-to-day.

The Avalanche continued to get consistency from the Cale Makar, who has been un-worldly in his performance to start the year. He cleared the 20-point benchmark with 1g/1a, the third NHLer to get to 20 points in 2024-25. At the conclusion of the Avalanche game, Makar (5g/16a) ranks among NHL-leaders in assists (1st), points (T-1st) and power-play points (10, T-1st). His goal on the power play at 2:54 to open the scoring and give the Avalanche a 1-0 lead extended his season-opening point streak to 12 games. The run is tied for the fourth-longest such streak in franchise history and is one shy of the longest in Avalanche history.

Nathan MacKinnon is also doing Hart Trophy type things. Assisting on that Makar goal extended his season-opening point streak to 12 games as well. He enters Tuesday one game shy of matching his career-best and Avalanche record of 13 straight games with a point to start a season.

Justus Annunen got the nod for the stat against the Preds to no surprise of anyone. Riding a 4 game winning streak, he turned away all 11 shots faced in the first period. But in the second with his team up 1-0, Steven Stamkos tied the game midway through the period with the man advantage on the only goal Annunen probably would want back. Colton Sissons closed out the second giving Nashville a 2-1 lead through 40 despite being outshot on the period 12-5.

The Predators, who bolstered their lineup over the summer with big names, have been dealing with their own struggles. They are having no trouble icing a team, rather, finding the right mix to make the chemistry work. Problem apparently solved. Roman Jossi made it 3-1 while Stamkos and Jonathan Marchessault added assists for the second PPG of the night.

Mackinnon cut the lead to 1 making it 3-2 at the 17:43 mark with Makar and Devon Toews adding the helpers. Colorado pulled Annunen hoping for the equalizer and had a solid run at it before Filip Forsberg found the empty net and then Gustav Nyquist would do the same finalizing the score at 5-2.

There is no question that the Avalanche need to find some more offense in addition to MacKinnon and Makar. Mikko Rantanen has been quiet, but his pedigree and fight will kick in, and I expect him to have an offensive surge against Seattle at Ball Arena Tuesday. The injection of Lehkonen and again, hopefully Drouin, should be a nice shot in the arm as well, providing some relief and additional scoring power.

The Avalanche will leave Nashville in the rearview, sharpen up some details and get back to work Monday for practice after Sunday’s rest.

Be a goldfish. And believe in believe.