Maybe the Colorado Avalanche have rediscovered their game in its entirety.
Philipp Grubauer made 38 saves in Nashville to help defeat the Predators, 5-0 Saturday afternoon.
The Avs have now won four in a row and five of their last six matches.
Nathan MacKinnon had a goal for Avs Saturday in win over Preds – file photo by Lewis Bleiman
Nathan MacKinnon struck for two goals and three points and Alexander Kerfoot also collected three points on a goal and two assists.
“We kind of looked ourselves in the mirror,” MacKinnon said. “We had to make a decision if we wanted to push for the playoffs or be a lottery team. We haven’t achieved our goal yet. Obviously we have 20 games left, but we’re on the right track so it feels good.”
The Jets had a chance to leap-frog the Winnipeg Jets and return to fist place in the Central Division.
“We’ve had a lot of tough years against Nashville,” MacKinnon said. “We haven’t won very many games against them in the regular season. I think in the playoffs we gained a little confidence in this building. We played well. We were in a lot of games. These guys are tough to play against, but [Grubauer] was our best player tonight.”
Gabriel Landeskog and Nikita Zadorov also scored for the Avs.
“At times we’re pretty good,” Avalanche coach Jared Bednar said. “I think the most competitive and sort of the most pushback that I’ve seen from our team consistently was when we played the Predators in the playoffs last year. So that’s kind of where I tried to set the new bar for our team, and we’ve had it at times here and we didn’t have it in others.
“I think a couple of recent games just against [the Winnipeg Jets] that we were good. We were physical. We were competing. We had the pushback and we were disciplined and won those games. Tonight is another example of it because I thought it was a well-played hockey game.”
Colorado improved to 27-24-11.
Nashville dropped to 36-23-5.
“It was a game that we were chasing the whole day,” Predators coach Peter Laviolette said. “They got the first one and scored a power-play goal. I thought we pushed and pressed the whole day. I mean, everything is going to line up in our favor except the scoreboard at the end of the night, but there were some things that I thought we could’ve done better.”
[WATCH: All Avalanche vs. Predators highlights]
Pekka Rinne made 16 saves in the loss.
“Honestly, I didn’t think it was a 5-0 game at all. I actually thought we played pretty well. We had a lot of chances, and they just capitalized on all of their chances. Like it sounds weird, it was 5-0, but I actually thought we played a pretty good game,”the Predators’ Roman Josi said.
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