The Colorado Avalanche beat up the Calgary Flames in a much-needed 4-2 win. These are the Avs studs and duds from the game.

Studs

The top line

The trio of Artturi Lehkonen-Nathan MacKinnon-Martin Necas combined for three goals and four assists last night. They helped create all four goals. They finished with 15 of Colorado’s 34 shots on goal.

Their fancystats were similarly dominant. In 14:19 of 5v5 time together, here were the advantages they created against the Flames:

• Shot attempts: 23-6
• Shots on goal: 14-5
• Scoring chances: 10-3
• High-danger chances: 5-1

Also, I mean, come on. Look at this stuff.

Come on. Come on!

I do want to highlight that an underrated part of that sequence was MacKinnon digging the puck out of Flames goaltender Dustin Wolf to keep possession alive. That kind of hard work led to quality puck retrievals from this line all night. You know, on the rare occasions they actually lost possession of it.

Things started poorly for everyone in an Avalanche sweater last night but boy howdy did they finish well. It was a bummer that Necas didn’t ever really get a chance to go for the hat trick when the Flames had the goaltender pulled because that would have been a fun little cherry on top of a good evening for Colorado.

It’s pretty remarkable that Necas has stepped into the spotlight in Colorado the way he has. Mikko Rantanen had large shoes to fill, both literally and figuratively, and through seven games Necas has handled the assignment as well as any of us could have hoped. This has been the best-case scenario with him so far.

Obviously, being the running mate alongside MacKinnon has certain perks to it, like scoring a lot and eventually getting paid a lot of money, but things had started to feel stale with Rantanen at the end. So many of us are like a kid marveling at a shiny new toy on Christmas Day, but MacKinnon genuinely looks refreshed and the way he and Necas have fit in has been nothing short of remarkable.

I watched plenty of Necas in Carolina so I know there are some lazy days coming where he will drive us all insane, but one area of his game that has taken an impressive uptick so far? Shooting. Necas “only” has three goals through seven games but has not been shy about shooting the puck.

He is up a full shot on goal per game from his Carolina tenure. I know that’s going to be skewed by his eight shots on goal last night, but even before that explosion of offense, it was still way up.

Necas knows he’s replacing a premier goal-scorer and is doing what he can to make an impact in that area. Last night was an extreme, but he is providing hope that his goal-scoring prowess can surpass what he produced in Carolina.

Sam Malinski

Moved up in the lineup almost out of necessity, Malinski got dropped into a situation where his play had not dictated he get a bigger role. His play has been poor more often than not over the last six weeks, but sometimes things just happen and we have to make the best of them.

That’s Malinski right now. Last night, we saw the version of Malinski that had us buzzing about him in the early going of this season. Dynamic with the puck, competitive defensively, disruptive with his stick. All things that make Malinski tick when he’s at his best were things he did throughout the game last night.

Even when he had a goal wiped off the board because Jonathan Drouin was practically in Edmonton already and was called for offside (how did that get missed during live action??), Malinski kept pushing.

His confidence has been on shaky ground for a while now so I was worried that the setback of his goal coming back would be a real problem. Instead, it looked like he used the relief of finally scoring to kickstart his game into a healthier place altogether.

Alongside Sam Girard, they played 13:24 of 5v5 time and generated 10 scoring chances and four high-danger chances while only allowing four and one, respectively. The defense is absolutely the concern with them together and they aced the test.

Also, this outlet pass to Necas is absolutely insane.

He can say that it was unintentional all he wants. That’s fine. He’s earned a few breaks like that with the lack of production he’s been saddled with this season.

Mackenzie Blackwood

Colorado’s very own “Steady Yeti” was just that last night. While the Avs were fumbling about and giving pucks away to Calgary early in the game, Blackwood was puffing his chest out and turning away just about everything.

The only goal that beats him is Jonathan Huberdeau’s goal on a 5v3 advantage. I actually want to highlight one of those hockey things that I think is cool here. Watch Blackwood fight through this screen on that goal. This is the moment Huberdeau releases the shot.

Goalies have to find a way to see the puck somehow and that means leaning one way or the other. Blackwood leans left and Huberdeau takes advantage of that.

That’s a cool thing to me. The way the game breaks down into decisions and execution. Anyway, Blackwood giving up a goal on a 5v3 and then nothing until Rasmus Andersson beats him with a softie late in a 4-1 game is fine with me. I’m not mad about it.

I’m not mad because Blackwood was exactly what the Avalanche needed early on. In the previous goaltending regime, that would have been a three-goal deficit in the first 10 minutes before the Avs had bothered to get their legs under them and get going.

Blackwood got them through the turbulent start, steadied the ship, and look at the game flow from there.

The Mackenzie Blackwood era is off to a fun start. He’s fun. Good goaltending is better than bad goaltending.

Duds

That awful start

Okay but in that game flow image above, you see those red bars on the far left side? That’s two penalties in the first three minutes of the game. Girard getting booked for Hooking and Calvin de Haan celebrating his return to the lineup with a Delay of Game penalty put the Avs on the backfoot immediately.

Calgary scored, obviously, and it could have spelled doom from there. It didn’t, which is a credit to Colorado’s resiliency in this game.

It wasn’t just the penalties, though, of which they took another one later in the first period and two more in the second period. It was the puck management, the energy level, the general desire to actually care about playing against the team that was right behind them in the Wild Card standings.

After giving two points to the Vancouver Canucks earlier in the week, who is right behind the Flames in the playoff chase, the Avs needed to put a little breathing room between them in order to go into the break not feeling quite as unsure of themselves. There are obviously still games to go, but winning head-to-head games is huge.

For them to come out so lackluster, especially after how the game in Vancouver finished, was just downright disappointing. This Avs team struggles with consistency in ways they haven’t in years and the way they manage games is a huge part of that. The Avs are good for an absolutely awful stretch every night, it’s just a matter of when it comes and if they can survive it.

We see the Avs battling themselves as often as they are battling the other team. In the last ~week, we’ve watched goals come off the board for goaltender interference (twice!) and now a clear-cut offside.

They opened this game by putting the Flames on a 5v3 just 2:52 into the game. It’s that kind of self-sabotage that were it to happen outside of a game, you would be focusing on in weekly sessions with a therapist. The Avs struggle so badly to get out of their own way and we saw that last night.

Once they finally did get their head on straight, they blew Calgary away. It wasn’t close from there.

Avs Unsung Hero

Miles Wood

I wrote extensively after the Canucks game about what I didn’t like from Wood and why. Last night was very different.

When Frankenstein’s Monster, now dressed as Flames forward Adam Klapka, smoked MacKinnon into the boards in the second period, Wood grabbed his pitchfork and tried to wrangle the big fella. He didn’t do very well in the fight, but the effort was admirable.

Everything I didn’t like about his response against the Canucks with Logan O’Connor did not apply this time around. That was a situation to let O’Connor handle his business. MacKinnon? Go defend your superstar.

I was all about Wood doing that, even if they gave him the instigator and it meant he put the Avalanche on another penalty kill. That’s a penalty you kill 10 times out of 10.

That’s the kind of stuff Wood should be doing, especially as his war with the puck continues. He found a way to bring some energy, send a message, and do the role player stuff that Colorado has struggled with at times this season. That’s a good response after a tough night in Vancouver. 30 penalty minutes on this trip so far! Can’t wait to see what he has cooked up for us in Edmonton tonight.