Following an impressive east coast road trip, the Colorado Avalanche had to come home to take on its toughest eastern test yet. The Tampa Bay Lightning rolled into Denver on Wednesday night and two of the NHL’s best teams in the first month of the season put their skills on display.
It was a Colorado-dominated game early on in the first period when the Avalanche jumped out all over the visitors and were creating prime scoring chances. Some great saves by Lightning netminder Andrei Vasilevskiy kept the game tied until Colorado’s top line did what it does as well as anyone in the NHL.
Just as a penalty on Tyson Jost was ending, Nathan MacKinnon gathered the puck and flew out of the defensive zone, crossing the blue line with Jost and Gabe Landeskog flanking him. Some fancy dangles and a sweet backhand pass and Landeskog one-timed it home to give Colorado the 1-0 lead.
Unfortunately for Colorado, that lead lasted about 15 seconds because Tampa Bay challenged the play for an offside and after a brief video review it was determined Jost had lifted his leg just before MacKinnon crossed the blue line with the puck, negating the goal and giving the Lightning a little life.
Tampa Bay is the kind of team that takes advantage of second chances and they used the disallowed goal as a springboard to begin taking over the game. It took a while as each team traded very soft penalties through the first and second periods before heading into the decisive final frame for the stalemate to finally break.
Tyson Barrie was called for lifting the stick of a Lightning player and they determined it was hooking. On their third power play of the game, Nikita Kucherov took a cross-ice feed from Steven Stamkos and one-timed it past Semyon Varlamov at 6:24, giving Tampa Bay the 1-0 lead.
Colorado had its chances down the stretch, including breakaways from Nathan MacKinnon (where he might have been hooked but not call was made) and Mikko Rantanen (who failed to get a shot on goal), but nothing was able to beat Vasilevskiy in an early-season battle between two goaltenders having very good starts to their seasons.
The Avalanche were unable to make a substantial push in the final two minutes with the goaltender pulled and despite having some good looks at the empty net, the Lightning came up short in adding to their total. It didn’t end up mattering and the Avalanche fell 1-0 to Tampa Bay.
0 Comments (6 conversations)
Fsmcnab
Avs never seemed to recover from that offsides call. Jost especially.
pixelrebirth
I had a deep gut feeling that would determine the game and I was right. Jost needs some AHL time IMO, if he is waiver exempt, to get his confidence up more. Jost looked bad on PP too.
rb9cms
He’s just 20 and super skilled but hasn’t figured out his NHL game yet. The entire 1st PP looks a little flustered with how they are being defended this season. He’s best there when he can slide to the side of the slot and one time the pass from the goal line or those tips from the slot With Barrie off to a cool start, those opportunities have been limited too. I agree he needs a little jolt, whether it be the AHL or a night in the press box.
HolidayHippie
Is it just me, or did Barrie seem to absolutely suck ass tonight. I can remember at least 3-4 times that he literally just gave away the puck. Nemeth is playing better than he is at this point.
Jose
Barrie just does not seem to be playing at the same fast pace as the rest of the team. Is he living in the past?
pat2717
I agree. I don’t know if the league just caught up with TB or if he’s lost a bit but it seems like he’s a touch slower than he used to be. He’s still great in so many ways so I’m not kicking him to the curb or anything but if he ends up getting traded then it may be a positive based upon the return we get plus making some room for Makar.
Rich
I thought the coaching staff did a poor job adjusting to the Tampa’s D during the power play. Tampa restricted the puck movement at the points which seem to confuse the usual puck flow from high to low. Thoughts?
Botchcassidy
I ain’t mad at that game at all. Thought the avs played really well against a fantastic team. Other than Josty, who seems a bit lost out there. Kid has a ton of talent but just looks like he can’t hack it when it counts. Also: Put Kamenev in the damn lineup bedsy!
B
That was a WEAK penalty call on Barrie. His blade was basically flat on the ice and his stick was riding along the guy’s shin pad. Followed by a no call on MacKinnon’s chance.
Nels
Terrible, terrible officiating. Unless they were trying to get the Avs to lose. Then they did a good job.