The Avs respond in a big way, dominating the Stars in a 5-2 victory

The 7-3 thrashing the Avalanche took at the hands of the Stars a month ago was fresh on everybody’s mind on Saturday night at Ball Arena. Losing on Wednesday at home to Minnesota only heightened the intensity against Dallas.

With the Stars destined to have elements of fatigue after beating the Coyotes the night before, there were no excuses. Either you are that team, or you aren’t.

The Avs took care of business by extinguishing the Stars 5-2.

Avs head coach Jared Bednar was quick to point out there were too many passengers in the loss to the Wild. He promised one-on-one meetings. The message clearly carried over to the first period of action, as the Avs matched the physical presence of the Stars.

Nathan MacKinnon picked up multiple goals on the night. His first was a point-blank howitzer that beat Dallas goalie Jake Oettinger. Mac has been nothing short of spectacular since returning from his pesky injury suffered midway through the season. He now has his 276th career goal and 97th point of the season.

“Nate the Great” collected 99 points in the 2018-19 season where he played in all 82 regular season games. He tallied 97 points in 74 games the previous year. To be on the precipice of breaking both marks in only his 64th game of this season is a testament to the run of dominance he’s been on.

“You know the intensity Nate has,” said Bednar on MacKinnon’s ability to come through when it matters most. “As the games get bigger, we’ve seen him get better.

There’s a distinct reason why.

“Some guys can produce early in the year when things are loose and it’s not that important,” Bednar explained. “When the checking dials up, some guys dry up offensively. Nate is the exact opposite. The tougher it gets, the more he becomes a big difference maker.”

The Stars weren’t taking things lightly. Granted, playing the Coyotes isn’t the biggest challenge in the world. But head coach Pete DeBoer put out his No. 1 goalie on back-to-back nights. Facing only 18 shots against the Yotes probably didn’t exhaust Otter, but perhaps there was just enough standing around that caused him to lose a pinch of focus as Logan O’Connor was able to beat him five hole in the second period. O’Connor, to the disbelief of Bo Byram, insisted he was going between the pads all the way.

“I saw he had a bit of a bad gap,” said LOC. “I used that gap to my advantage and was fortunate enough to squeak by there.”

Up 2-0 is always a dangerous margin. The Avs seemed determined to not let off the gas. They poured on the pressure shift after shift when a strange broken stick upset the apple cart.

Unbeknownst to J.T. Compher, the blade of his stick snapped off as he was defending deep in his own zone. It was a cruel April Fools Day joke to reach for a puck with only a partial piece of wood. It is a rare penalty because usually it’s damn obvious when you only have portions of your stick. For safety reasons, you are required to drop your stick as soon as it breaks. You aren’t allowed to play with a spear. Although, going Captain Jack Sparrow on the ice would be entertaining.

The Stars didn’t have much going on during their power play until the very end when Tyler Seguin slipped behind Matt Nieto and craftily slid the puck past Alexander Georgiev. It was a momentary lapse in an otherwise solid second-period performance.

The Avs only allowed seven total shots on goal in the second, which was remarkable considering the Stars had three power plays. With the hockey gods shining their light on Colorado, good karma broke through.

Twelve seconds remained in the period when Nathan MacKinnon was fed a pass at the point from Mikko Rantanen. Mac didn’t get a solid grip on the puck. It fluttered towards the net. Oettinger thought he had his bases covered. With his left leg extended, there was a sliver of space between his skate blade and the pipe. That’s all that was needed for the puck to slip through.

For a moment, in the third period, a late collapse looked possible. The Stars scored a garbage goal. It was another unattended loose puck flipped in without precise nature or intent. However, a brilliant Bednar challenge revealed O’Connor was pushed into Alexandar Georgiev negating the goal. It was a night when things just went right.

“High,” said Bednar on his level of confidence about winning the challenge. “As soon as I saw it, I thought it was goalie interference. You can’t go into the goalie on your own and you can’t force somebody into the goalie. I thought there was a really good chance it would get turned over.”

The final two minutes were a collection of weirdness. The Stars pulled the goalie with more than three minutes to go. Valeri Nichuskin tipped in what may have been Rantanen’s 49th goal of the season. He sheepishly apologized to Mikko. Byram picked up a penalty with less than two minutes to go allowing the Stars to snare a power play goal 30 seconds later. Once again, the Stars pulled the goalie.

Rantanen then did something he had never done in his entire hockey career. From roughly 150 feet away from the goal, Mikko flipped the puck like a Finnish flapjack. Through the air the puck soared dramatically, ending its journey going bar down notching Rantanen his 49th of the year.

“Empty netters don’t count,” joked Rantanen about getting one goal closer to 50.

His coach disagreed.

“You are going to think about it; it’s human nature,” said Bednar when asked about Mikko circling the big 5-0. “You don’t think about it at 39 or 40. When it’s a ways away, you just don’t. I don’t want him to have it in his head. But now, he can taste it. I just want him to relax, keep playing his game and he will get there.”

The Avs win set things straight once again. They have had a bad habit of occasionally losing focus. However, once spanked by Bednar, they always seem to bounce back.

“Like I said, you aren’t going to win every game,” said Bednar. “But your response after losses is huge. The main thing with our group is we are gonna be there to compete. I think our guys checked all those boxes tonight.”

While nobody will start planning a parade based on winning against a team playing the second game of a back-to-back, the Avs did what they needed to do to keep pace and alert the rest of their playoff foes.

They ain’t dead yet.

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