In Denver, the Avalanche got a little healthy on Sunday night in a 6-2 win over the visiting San Jose Sharks.
Nathan MacKinnon hit for a pair of goals and four points on the night to push his point streak to 15 games.
“I feel very clear,” MacKinnon said. “I’d say the game feels like it’s slow, which is always a good, good feeling. Obviously, doing a lot of work away from the rink that no one sees, and it’s paying off right now.
Alexandar Georgiev made 27 saves in the win.
The Avs improved to 19-10-2.
Colorado scored three times in the first period to take control of the game.
Valeri Nichushkin scored off the power play at 7:18 of the opening stanza to give the Avalanche a 1-0 lead.
Mikko Rantanen hit off the power play as well, at 12:15 to extend the advantage to 2-0.
Miles Wood scored with 1:40 left in the period to make it 3-0 headed to the second period.
“I thought we accomplished everything we wanted to in the first period,” Colorado coach Jared Bednar said. “Got back for pucks in a hurry, tried to simplify our game on our exits, and then we wanted to have a linear, fast attack.”
MacKinnon hit for the first of his double at 3:44 of the middle frame.
“He’s always been an exceptional worker off the ice,” Bednar said. “He sets himself up for success on game day by the way he prepares, whether that’s the gym, diet, practice. You watch him in practice, and he doesn’t want to do a lot of reps of one thing, but when he does his reps, he does them full speed, gets what he needs out of it, and then he’s ready to move on to something else.
“That’s the example that he sets for us. So, everything that he does, even before and after practice work, it’s something that he’s identified that he wants to improve on or stay sharp on. And he drags other guys into that. His preparation and his competitiveness is why he’s as good as he is.”
The e Sharks dropped to 9-19-3.
Tomas Hertl hit for a double in the Sharks loss.
“It’s just a hard team to play when you give them three goals and you take that many minutes, nine minutes, in penalties in the first period,” San Jose coach David Quinn said. “No one’s getting into a rhythm and there’s no tempo. It was a really strange game the way it started, and you spot them three, it’s tough to come back to beat that team.”
Hertl got the Sharks on the board at 9:01 of the second, of the power play to make it 4-1 to Colorado going to the third period.
In the third, Ryan Johansen ballooned the lead to 5-1 at 9:01.
Hertl potted his double midway through the third to make it 5-2 to the Avs.
“There’s areas that we could have done better throughout the whole game, I think,” the Sharks’ Mario Ferraro said. “It wasn’t our best performance, but I liked our compete and our hard work. It’s unfortunate the way it went, the way it started, but it is what it is and we’ve got to move on and try to improve.”
MacKinnon picked up his second of the night at at 15:11 for the 6-2 final count.
Mackenzie Blackwood made 22 saves in the loss..
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