Avs-Kings Game 49 Studs & Duds

Studs

Logan O’Connor

Two more goals for O’Connor and now we can start having the conversation about him pushing for a 20-goal season. That’s fun to say. Both goals were pretty great finishes from LOC and I’m not going to nitpick.

I thought his game quieted down a bit after the goals, but come on, he scored two goals in the first period. What is there to say? The Avs only have two games this week so I doubt he gets there but it would be awesome to see him get one of the NHL’s three stars of the week.

Nathan MacKinnon

Two more points for MacKinnon have him tied with Bobby Orr for the second-longest home scoring streak to open a season at 25 games. Might be a big reason the Avs are now 20-5 at Ball Arena this season. Just Hart Trophy things, you know?

The Kings specifically were trying to defend the speed of MacKinnon and the Avalanche by running out a 1-3-1 system in the neutral zone and MacKinnon’s first-period goal still came in transition. It was also the last goal Cam Talbot surrendered before being pulled at first intermission.

MacKinnon picked up an assist on Cale Makar’s third-period power-play goal and has taken over the league’s scoring lead once again. It will be tougher to hang on to that when teams catch up to Colorado’s games played advant…oh wait? Are you telling me Tampa Bay has the same number of games? Well, that’s pretty interesting.

Anyway, MacKinnon was excellent once again and helped drive the Avalanche to another win. He’s pretty good.

Alexandar Georgiev

Georgiev has received plenty of flack (including from me), especially after a dubious All-Star nomination when multiple goaltenders in the Central Division have outperformed him, but he has finished strong going into the break.

Tonight was his best game since his shutout against Vegas. He made multiple big stops on Trevor Moore (Sorry, Meghan) when the game was still close and his stop on Kevin Fiala after Fiala’s four-minute penalty kept the game from getting to 3-2 and Josh Manson made it 4-1 right after.

That’s the kind of game-changing save he hasn’t been making this year. No excuses. Yes, Fiala is arguably the best goal-scoring forward on that team but he made the stop on the breakaway. He got it done and it changed the game. That’s the good stuff. That’s the stuff the Winnipeg Jets have gotten this season to paper over any of their mistakes.

Georgiev getting into a rhythm going into the break is exactly what they need and what everyone else out west has been hoping would not happen. Now the overworked goaltender will have plenty of rest despite having to make an appearance in Toronto for the All-Star festivities.

A .962 save percentage feels like a godsend after some of the performances this month (he had an .888 coming into the game).

Duds

Jack Johnson

Tough night for Johnson coming back into the lineup, but we saw some familiar results playing out that are troublesome. At least to me.

Johnson was a drag on whatever pairing he was played on as Bowen Byram produced poor results alongside him but solid results when Byram was next to Sam Girard. Is that entirely Johnson’s fault? Hard to say yes to that, but it is something we have consistently seen over Johnson’s entire tenure here.

This was just one game, though, and I’m not punishing him for his results over the last three years. No, I think the results were tough enough tonight that I can safely say this was not what the Avs had in mind when they shuttled Sam Malinski back to the AHL for the break.

The Kings had 17 scoring chances at 5v5 in this game. 10 came against Johnson. They had 16 shots on goal, 10 came against Johnson. They had nine high-danger chances. Six came against Johnson.

Johnson finds himself in a surprising dogfight for playing time as Colorado’s 6th D right now thanks to the strong performance from Malinski. It would be hard to envision Malinski fully unseating Johnson, but he has to be better than he was tonight to keep the rookie at bay.

Unsung Hero

Ross Colton

Did you know Colton has six points in his last three games? And that he now has 16 assists on the season, just one shy of his career-high? And that he is currently on a 45-point pace? I didn’t know those things either until I went and looked. That’s a passable second-line center while the team looks for an upgrade in that spot and it’s a damn fine third-line center if they go and acquire that upgrade.

Just as impressively is that Colton isn’t getting outrageous minutes to produce those numbers. Tonight, he had two assists in only 16:29 of ice time. That’s not a guy getting force fed minutes and producing at an outlier rate. It’s a guy getting work done at a position he is probably ill-suited to play and everyone is finding a way together.

The assists tonight weren’t anything spectacular. He cycled a puck to Miles Wood on the first goal and then won a faceoff on the second goal. Sounds easy enough, but a guy who can do both of those things was a concern when J.T. Compher left in free agency. It would appear Colton has done an adequate job replacing him.