Jared Bednar not surprised Game 2 ‘settled down after a bit of hectic start’

Colorado Avalanche head coach Jared Bednar witnessed 15 combined goals in Game 1 like everyone else.

He was hoping Game 2 between the Avs and Minnesota Wild wouldn’t follow a similar script.

But for a brief moment on Tuesday night at Ball Arena it looked like it might.

Only 2:57 into the game the Avalanche and Wild were tied 1-1. Colorado’s Martin Necas made it 1-0 then Minnesota’s Kirill Kaprizov answered back only six seconds later.

Luckily the Avalanche would take a 4-1 lead deep into the third period and the Wild didn’t get a second goal until about 5.5 minutes to go in the contest. This wasn’t the chaos of Game 1 and ultimately resulted in a 5-2 victory for Colorado to take a commanding 2-0 series lead.

In the postgame press conference Jared Bednar was asked if he thought “here we go again” after seeing a couple of goals before the clock even read 17:00 left in the first period.

Asked Avalanche head coach Jared Bednar if he felt like “here we go again” when it was 1-1 three minutes into the game, but also if he liked how his guys settled down.

He knew this wasn’t ever going to be like Game 1 and was proud of the team. pic.twitter.com/RTzKVi2Cbp

— Will Petersen (@PetersenWill) May 6, 2026

“Yeah, I was hoping not,” Jared Bednar said with a laugh. “That was a tough goal to give up right when we score. We go to the face-off and make a read on a loose puck, and it’s the wrong read or they get another touch on it from a second effort and then they tie it right away. So, not the ideal response to scoring a big goal.”

After that, the Avalanche did have the ideal response.

Gabriel Landeskog would score on the power play to make it 2-1 Colorado after the opening frame. Nicolas Roy added a second period goal and then Nathan MacKinnon put the Avs up 4-1 with about seven minutes left to essentially seal the victory.

“Yeah I knew going into it that it wasn’t going to be the same game,” Bednar said. “That they were going to be better in their areas they wanted to be and we were going to be better in areas we wanted to be. It didn’t surprise me that the game kind of settled down after a bit of hectic start.”

The Avalanche have already proven throughout these playoffs they can win in all kinds of different ways.

And that has to make Jared Bednar smile, as it’s a key mark of a championship team. The journey to a Stanley Cup isn’t even half over, but right now, Colorado is rolling.

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