A tornado emerges victorious in a battle between an avalanche and a hurricane

Sometimes you Storm Surge, sometimes the storm surges you.

In a battle of nature versus different nature, it was other nature that ended up prevailing tonight as the Avalanche topped the Hurricanes, 3-2.

The real difference-maker, however, was La Tornade as a perfect finish from Sam Girard at 17:23 of the third period broke a tie and provided a little measure of revenge for Colorado.

You’ll remember when these two teams met in Denver back in December, Colorado had a 1-0 lead late in the third period before two quick goals sparked a shocking 3-1 comeback win over the Avalanche and kickstarted a host of problems in the third period that clearly haven’t fully gone away.

Girard’s goal put a halt to another Canes comeback as Carolina entered the third period trailing 2-0. Teuvo Teravainen scored twice in the third period to get the Canes back to even.

The first was a lucky bounce that was initially stopped by Pavel Francouz but came down on Ian Cole and deflected softly into the net as Francouz scrambled to recover.

The second was a terrible play by the Avs as a whole that helped spring Teravainen for a clean breakaway and he beat Francouz with a pretty soft shot. That tied the game and put the crowd into overdrive as Carolina was dominating the Avs.

Francouz held strong, though, and the strong start produced by Colorado and Tyson Jost’s first two goals since November 30 helped get the Avalanche across the finish line.

Outshot 47-32, this was easily Colorado’s worst defensive effort since their first game back from the All-Star break when they gave up six goals to the Philadelphia Flyers. That’s where Francouz came in and made 45 stops, earning his fifth straight win and pushing the goaltender conversation back to the forefront.

The win was Colorado’s seventh straight on the road, tying a franchise record, and the fifth straight overall for the Central Division’s second-place team. The win moves Colorado three points behind St. Louis with two games in hand and three points ahead of Dallas with one game in hand.

It was a close call tonight but in a “spin to win” world, the Avs had the perfect player for the situation.

GAME TAKEAWAYS

• This season has, maybe more than any other, convinced me I just don’t know how to feel about goaltending in general. Pavel Francouz has been stellar lately and was so again tonight until the second Teravainen goal. He got lucky a handful of times along the way but that’s just hockey sometimes. The combination of both spectacular and then giving up a very iffy goal to tie the game leaves me back at square one of not really knowing what to make of this Avalanche goaltending duo. Ultimately, as long as whoever is in net allows under three, I don’t really care if one is soft, especially when you’re talking about nearly 50 shots on goal. Francouz was so good for so much of tonight, but the defense in front of him just wasn’t very good and the workload was heavy enough that tomorrow night we’ll likely see the Avalanche debut of Michael Hutchinson.
• Gabe Landeskog has received a fair amount of criticism recently for porous play but I thought he was pretty good throughout this one. His hard work along the wall and defensively was still an effective staple of his game. Where he had been struggling was in his playmaking ability and he put all of his strengths on display on the game-winning goal. He outworked Jaccob Slavin and fired a perfect cross-ice pass to a pinching Sam Girard. It was a perfect play for a guy who needed one to go his way in that department. Goodness, what a pass.
• That final goal also saw the smarts of Vladislav Namestnikov on display. He got put on the line next to Landeskog and MacKinnon and went in and helped Landeskog win the battle along the boards. When Girard got the cross-ice pass, Namestnikov went to the front of the net but made sure to stay on the backside of the net. That kept the other defenseman from fully committing to blocking Girard’s shot and helped keep the shooting lane nice and clear. Huge play from everyone involved. Very good hockey.
• Just a quick note on special teams. The PP was a struggle again tonight but instead of harping on the system again, tonight’s problem was a lot more player-based. They struggled to gain entry into the zone because of communication issues and execution failures across the board. Just an ugly night for that unit but for once it wasn’t the usual standing around waiting for someone else to do something special. They didn’t even really get a chance to even do that. The penalty kill was solid, though unspectacular. They got lucky on the first PK of the night when Svechnikov beat Francouz five-hole but it bounced off the post and out. From there, I really liked what the PK did overall and that unit continues to improve as the year goes on. Trending upward for arguably their weakest unit all year is encouraging.
• This was a really scrappy win. Outgunned on the road in a very amped up environment, the Avs just worked their way through a bumpy road and got the win. You don’t love them losing another lead in the third period. You do love them bouncing back and getting two points to stay on pace with St. Louis. Just keep winning and let the chips fall where they may. This was a heart and soul win, straight up. It was also a good reminder that, with all the current injuries, they just don’t have the talent to go toe to toe with playoff teams. Not many teams are going to lose the players Colorado has and be able to sustain so that’s okay. But to scrap two points from this and ensure they get at least half of the available points on this back to back? Huge.
• From the “fun fact” department: Sam Girard, 32 points. Matt Duchene, 39 points.
• Cale Makar: 46 points and two shots across the bow of Andrei Svechnikov. Made him look bad twice, both in drawing a penalty and in keeping the puck in the at the line for the second Avs goal.