Colorado secured an uneventful 4-2 win.
In their second meeting with the Nashville Predators this week, the Colorado Avalanche were hoping for the opposite result after falling in a shoutout on Tuesday night. Christmas came early in this contest for several Avalanche players who hadn’t hit the scoresheet lately as Jack Drury and Victor Oloffson both scored in this contest along with Samuel Girard contributing two assists. Nathan MacKinnon and Val Nichushkin also scored as Colorado cruised to a fairly routine 4-2 win over Nashville.
The Game
A couple familiar themes emerged to start this game. First Colorado got on the board in the opening minutes as Brent Burns fed Nathan MacKinnon for his 26th goal of the year surprising old friend in net Justus Annunen. Jack Drury would add another at the midpoint on a 4-on-4 before Nashville got one back just a minute later from Jonathan Marchessault on the power play. It wasn’t total domination, though, as the game was close to end the period 2-1 in Colorado’s favor with an 11-8 shot advantage.
The second period was more of the same as Nashville attempted to grind the game and keep it close. That worked until the Avalanche used the extra attacker on a delayed penalty which led Victor Olofsson to find a loose puck deflected to him right in the slot and he found the back of the net.Another old friend, this time Tyson Jost, took two minor penalties before the end of the period but Colorado couldn’t cash in on the power play and the score ended up at 3-1 to close out the second period.
Colorado played keep away with the puck in the third period but couldn’t add to their goal total until for some reason Nashville pulled their goaltender for the extra attacker with four minutes left in the game. They must have been in a giving mood as it took about 10 seconds before Colorado scored their fourth goal of the evening. Val Nichushkin was the beneficiary and quite fitting as he got whacked hard in the face by a Predator’s stick earlier in the period but also deserved a tally after contributing eight shots on goal in this contest.
Tyson Jost continued his eventful evening with his second goal of the year at one minute left in the game but the result was long decided by that point and the Avalanche secured their 4-2 win.
Takeaways
Scott Wedgewood put up another stellar performance as he held the fort down when the Avalanche weren’t firing on all cylinders in the first period. He made 27 saves on 29 shots for his 14th win on the season and was named first star of the game.
The power play is still ineffective going 0/4 in this game as Jared Bednar has been starting to shuffle personnel around on the top unit. A score wasn’t needed in this game so they’ll continue to tinker and hope to find some chemistry.
Upcoming
A couple days off and then a quick trip to visit the Seattle Kraken on Tuesday, December, 16th at 8 p.m. MT nationally televised on TNT.
Category: General Sports
