In Glendale, the Arizona Coyotes’ Darcy Kuemper made 33 saves to backstop a 3-0 win over the visiting Colorado Avalanche.
“Clearly, Arizona’s a team that’s firing on all cylinders,” Colorado coach Jared Bednar said. “I don’t know … we just weren’t in the same gear as they were in the first period, that’s for sure.
“Sometimes when you talk to your team about stuff, it still takes a little bit longer to figure it out.”
The shutout snapped Nathan MacKinnon’s point streak at 13 games.
“We’re just maturing as a group and doing a great job of staying even keel,” Kuemper said. “We don’t really get too high after a night like this and too low when it doesn’t go our way.”
Phil Kessel, Christian Dvorak and Conor Garland scored for the Coyotes.
“When we get going, we’re a tough team,” Kessel said. “We got some good goals, we defended well, and obviously [Kuemper] was great.”
Arizona is 8-2-1 in their last 11 games.
“We’ve got to get the puck to Phil on the power play. That’s our No. 1 option and he hasn’t really been getting it,” Coyotes coach Rick Tocchet said. “Basically, the game plan was to beat their pressure and get the puck to Phil, and that was a textbook goal. We love those goals.”
The Avs were outshot 17-3 in the second period.
“We can’t expect to start like that and end up with the result that we want,” Colorado’s Matt Nieto said. “We’re digging ourselves in a hole early and even if we come on, playing from behind like that is tough to do in this league.”
[WATCH: All Avalanche vs. Coyotes highlights]
Pavel Francouz made 25 saves in the loss.
“Our start cost us and we couldn’t recover. We’re beating ourselves and not playing the right way. But we have a good group in here and we’re going to battle through it. We’ll be just fine,” the Avalanche’s Ryan Graves said after the loss.
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