The two best teams in the NHL at the current moment. Before tonight’s matchup, the Colorado Avalanche sat in first place, the Anaheim Ducks in 2nd.
I’m not sure many people expected the Ducks to be as good as they’ve been recently, but they’ve shown up and out with a top-10 power play and a few players among league points leaders in Leo Carlsson and Cutter Gauthier.
Artturi Lehkonen was the first player tonight to get on the board, putting away a pass from Nathan MacKinnon just 28 seconds into the game. An early start is something this team has struggled with on and off this season, but they’ve figured it out here recently. The Avs dominated most of the first period, but the team leader in points, Leo Carlsson, tied things up for the Ducks late in the period.
The second period seemed to be a result of that late goal, losing some of the momentum they had carried for most of the first, but the Avs still held Anaheim to only six (SIX) shots during that frame. Who else but Gabe Landeskog, who’s had two goals called off this season, to put the team in the lead?
The third period didn’t see the Avs come out swinging, but they certainly found a shooting edge after Martin Necas put home a Nathan MacKinnon shot to make it 3-1. Parker Kelly, who had an incredible night off the scoresheet, gets an insurance goal on an empty-netter late in the period to finalize a 4-1 win.
The Gabriel Landeskog curse has ended!
What felt like years finally came to fruition in Tuesday’s game. Gabe Landeskog was lights out during Colorado’s series against Dallas in last year’s playoffs, but after making his regular-season return this year, he has had an understandably slow start through 16 games. He began the season on the second line, but has recently been seeing consistent time on the third line.
In both line situations, he’s had two goals called off this season, one during what turned into an OT loss against the Utah Mammoth, and again during the DOMINANT 9-1 win over the Edmonton Oilers on Saturday – both due to an offsides challenge.
To this point, he was the only forward on the team without a goal.
Tonight, 1,347 days after his last one on March 5th, 2022, he finally got a without-a-doubt clean regular-season goal on the board, joining the group and finally taking that next step to getting his game back to where he wants it to be.
A consistent effort is key
Before tonight’s game, the Avalanche were 4-0-2 when tied after the first period.
When leading after the 2nd? They are now 9-0-0.
Something Coach Jared Bednar has preached to his group through the start of the season so far is a full-60 effort. It’s something his group has mentioned in multiple postgame pressers, and the Avs have put a lot of work into improving it, especially in the last few games. Through the first ten, they were struggling with their goal differential in the first period. Now, they sit at 6th league-wide with a +4.
Victor Olofsson said, following his first hat trick in an Avs sweater, that putting up a complete game through an entire 60 is impossible, but playing the way you need to in the moments that matter is what this group is trying to make into a habit.
Now, it’s hard to say they won the first period if goals are all to go off of, but the effort through all 60, while maybe not consistent in tonight’s game, was steady enough to get a goal to find the lead in the 2nd and give the team the push they needed to win the 3rd, too.
