In Denver Tuesday night, offense and defense were on the same page as the Colorado Avalanche took home a 4-0 win over the Montreal Canadiens.
Avs rookie Mikko Rantanen picked up his first career NHL hat trick in the win.
“It’s a dream come true,” said Rantanen, who has five goals in the past five games, 11 this season. “You watch other guys when you are younger, watch guys score hat tricks and the crowd is going wild, so it’s a dream come true. The most important thing was the two points.
“I think we earned a little payback from what happened in Montreal. No one was happy, it was embarrassing. We were really sharp tonight and we played a solid 60 minutes.”
Colorado won for the second straight game, something they had not done since November and improved to 15-33-2.
Montreal has now lost four straight and dropped to 30-17-8.
“We knew they were going to give their all after the result in our building, and we just played a very poor game,” the Habs’ Max Pacioretty said. “It was just very poor, I don’t know what else to say. It’s unacceptable and we have three games here before break. We got to find it, we have to bear down and try to find three wins.”
Andreas Martinsen also scored for Colorado.
WATCH: All Canadiens vs. Avalanche highlights
Carey Price.made 22 saves in the loss.
“That had something to do with the way the first game went in Montreal,” Price said. “We’ve got to be prepared for that. That’s not a good game, nothing to be proud of.”
On the other end of the ice, Calvin Pickard made 27 stops in the win and also picked up his first assist of the season on the Martinsen goal.
“These last couple games we’ve been a four-line team, we’ve gotten contributions from the other lines and offensive plays, scoring chances, goals. [Calvin Pickard] was good in goal. We just couldn’t put it all together (before) and we’ve been able to do that the last two nights,” Avs head coach Jared Bednar said after the win.
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