The thing to keep in mind about this match was, the Anaheim Ducks had a 4-2 lead after 20 minutes of play in Denver on Tuesday night.
Four goals in one period, and reliever Philipp Grubauer made 15 saves to get the win for the Avalanche in an 8-4 decision.
Hunter Miska got the start for the Avs and surrendered all four Anaheim goals while making just three saves.
The Avs struck for six unanswered goals in the final 40 minutes of the game.
“Giving up seven goals is not what you set out to do,” the Ducks’ Ryan Getzlaf said. “Had a great first period with four goals, which is a big outbreak for our team, but we didn’t do a good enough job around our net. They had a lot of chances in the first period. [Miller] made some saves, they hit some posts and we had a chance to win the hockey game. I felt we didn’t protect our net.”
Adam Henrique and Troy Terry had goals for the Ducks. The same Henrique who cleared waivers had three points in the first period.
“We went into the third tied and in-between periods we spoke about that, even though we had the lead (after the first),” Anaheim head coach Dallas Eakins said. “The relevant part was that it was an even game on the road against a top team and we just needed to get a kill going to start the period and go back to a simple, boring game on the road. The goal to start the period near the end of the penalty kill wasn’t great and we just couldn’t sustain their pressure.”
The Avs’ Nazem Kadri struck for two goals and four points on the night.
“We (Andre Burakovsky and Brandon Saad) work pretty well as a line,” Kadri said. “We’re always talking, communicating, that’s a big key to know where each guy is on the ice. We’ve definitely been playing well. I think we’ve been pretty solid for the most part and we’re going to look forward to doing that down the stretch.”
Saad, Burakovsky, Mikko Rantanen,and Samuel Girard also had goals and multi-point nights for Colorado.
“We have high standards set for our team,” Colorado head coach Jared Bednar said. “We want to be a potent offensive team, and we want to make sure that we’re one of the top defending teams in the League as well. I didn’t like some of our habits in the first period when it comes to defending. We handed them Grade A quality chances, we turned over some pucks and gave them some more chances. I don’t think that can be acceptable, so we had a chat after the first and our guys responded.”
Danton Heinen and Derek Grant also scored for the Ducks.
Pierre-Edouard Bellemare popped in an empty-net goal with under four minutes left in the third period.
Nathan MacKinnon also scored for the Avalanche.
Ryan Miller made 28 saves in the loss.
You must be logged in to post a comment.