In Winnipeg, Nathan MacKinnon had a goal and two points for the Colorado Avalanche on Friday night.
It was his sixth straight multi-point game for the Avs.
“Some of our top finishers in MacKinnon and [Mikko] Rantanen, they kind of lead the way out of the gate and it carried over for the rest of our hockey game,” Colorado coach Jared Bednar said. “I think we had a good start, no question. We were skating, we were winning some puck touches in the [defensive] zone that got us off to the races and odd-man rushes. I just thought we had some good jump.”
Alexandar Georgiev made 26 saves in the Colorado win.
“What a great first period for us,” Georgiev said. “We came out strong and capitalized on the chances right away and kind of had control of the game ever since then.”
The Avalanche improved to 32-19-5.
MacKinnon scored with just 19 seconds off the game clock for a 1-0 lead on a breakaway goal.
Mason Appleton tied it 1-1.
“They scored 19 seconds into the game. It’s unacceptable,” Appleton said. “We rebounded, scored a goal, tied it up, and then from there we were chasing the game once they scored their second goal. You want to give credit to them, they’re a really good hockey team, but we didn’t help ourselves tonight. We’re a really good hockey team when we want to be. We were not that tonight.
Mikko Rantanen scored 1:20 later for a 2-1 lead to the Avs.
“[We had] some really good discipline, structurally sound, made them earn all their chances,” Bednar said. “I thought we did a nice job on the defending side of it, moved the puck pretty efficiently tonight, so it turned out to be a pretty good performance for our group.”
J.T. Compher and Bowen Byram added goals in the first for a 4-1 lead after the first 20 minutes of play.
“[The Avalanche] showed us what the benchmark is,” Jets defenseman Brenden Dillon said. “They’re a team that’s won and knows the importance of these games and how to rise to the occasion. We’ve got to take the lesson from that.”
Matt Nieto added a marker in the middle frame for the 5-1 final.
“Probably a good burst of energy for us to start off strong,” Georgiev said. “For me, still a lot of hockey left, so you try to forget and keep going like that. It was a good thing that we came out strong like that.”
The Jets dropped to 35-23-1
Connor Hellebuyck got the start and yielded all five goals from the Avs, he made 21 saves before getting the hook in the second intermission.
David Rittich made 10 saves in a mop up role.
You must be logged in to post a comment.