Takeaways from Colorado's demolition of Buffalo

I’ve always been a big believer in how you respond to adversity says the most about you. Bad things happen to all of us but how you handle yourself when things are on fire, that’s really what brings out the character.

The Avs weren’t anywhere close to “things are on fire” mode yet, but after a frustrating 6-3 loss to the Philadelphia Flyers over the weekend, Colorado absolutely had to respond.

Playing against a bad Buffalo Sabres team missing a few players, including key defenseman Rasmus Dahlin, was just the kind of opportunity to get right.

And holy smokes did the Avs ever get right.

A 6-1 win over the sinking Sabres put the Avalanche back in the win column in their second game back from the NHL’s longest hiatus.

Seeing a score like that, it’s natural to assume Nathan MacKinnon and friends went off and destroyed another NHL team’s night but in reality, they only accounted for the sixth goal in a game that was pretty much decided by that point.

Instead, it was Colorado’s second line full of guys acquired over the summer that stepped up and did the dominating.

Up 1-0 after the most random goal of the year by Sam Girard, the only guy on the ice who knew where the puck was at the time, Andre Burakovsky got to work.

Flying through the neutral zone after receiving a chip pass from Nazem Kadri, Burakovsky entered the offensive zone with just one defender in front of him and Val Nichushkin on his flank. Burakovsky opted to do what he does best – shoot.

It was a good decision as he smoked Carter Hutton to make it 2-0 and get that line running downhill on the night.

A Sabres goal with .9 seconds left didn’t turn into any meaningful momentum for Buffalo and Colorado’s second line completely took over the game. Goals from Kadri and Nikita Zadorov (on assists from Burakovsky and Nichushkin) opened the game up to 4-1 and got things headed in the right direction for the Avs.

Nichushkin would get a goal of his own halfway through the period to make it 5-1 and then Mikko Rantanen made the first shot faced by rookie Jonas Johansson a memorable one as he blew the puck by him for the 6-1 lead.

When the dust settled, the second line was full of accomplishments.

– Kadri had two points, one goal and one assist
– Nichushkin tying his career-high  with three points, one goal and two assists
– Burakovsky tying his career-high with four points, one goal and three assists.

Add in a goal from Colorado’s top line and two from the Avs’ defensemen and it all adds up to an Avalanche blowout.

Colorado is now 1-1 on their current five-game road trip. Ottawa is next up on Thursday.

GAME TAKEAWAYS

• Burakovsky is now officially having a career year. His acquisition over the summer had the most boom/bust potential and he has definitely boomed. What’s maybe more interesting is Burakovsky has 12 multi-point games this season. Instead of scoring a little in a lot of games, he’s been scoring a lot in some of the games. I might go take a look at how the Avs results have matched up with Burakovsky’s multi-point efforts because that’s pretty interesting. Regardless, he’s been a great addition and emerging as a key player for Colorado’s potential playoff run.
• Kadri just does what he does. He’s so consistent it’s remarkable. It will be interesting to see how he rises to the occasion of the second half. He always had a reputation in Toronto as a guy who found the extra gear as others were tiring late in the season. If that ends up holding true in Colorado, the Avs will be a very tough nightly out.
• It was a shaky start for the Avs but their skill level eventually took over and they settled into what amounted to a high-intensity practice in the second half of the game. Despite blowing out Buffalo, Colorado still outshot the Sabres in the third period. A large reason for the game being 0-0 when the Avs finally found their legs was the work of Philipp Grubauer. Coming off a frustrating performance against the Flyers, Grubauer got it back tonight and stepped up to the challenge. He made several big saves early on that kept the Sabres from putting Colorado on the back foot and when the team dominated, he didn’t allow the door to a comeback to open up at all. A good night for Grubauer, who now is tasked with stringing a few of them together.
• Pretty remarkable what this team looks like when special teams aren’t a factor, isn’t it? The Avs had zero power plays and only had to kill two penalties, one early on and one late in the third. The rest of it was played at even strength and it was no surprise the Avs looked their best in a while when they got to do what they do best – skate teams into the ground at 5v5 and make everyone else look bad.
• Plenty has been made of Colorado’s inability to come from behind this season and their 0-11-1 record in games in which they’ve entered the third period trailing. Just 12 of 51 games, though, and on the flip side, the Avs moved to 14-0 on the year when scoring five or more goals. It’s remarkable that Colorado has 14 games of scoring five or more goals versus just 12 in which they’ve entered the third period trailing. Getting a comeback win or two would be nice, just to prove they can do it, but that five-goal trend is even better.
• Quietly, Rantanen got another goal and now has points in four straight games. He had been living large off several huge nights but if Rantanen is going to find his groove and start producing nightly, look out Central Division.
• Speaking of which, the Stars lost in OT tonight so they remain ahead of Colorado by one point. The Avs have two games in hand on Dallas. Colorado is now also six points behind the Blues with two games in hand on St. Louis (Note: It’s now back to eight points and three games in hand). The chase is on.