Avalanche superstar Nathan MacKinnon did everything he could in Game 1 against the Dallas Stars. But the rest of the Avs were mostly ineffective as Colorado lost 5-3 at Rogers Place in Edmonton on Saturday.
Dallas scored three of its goals off turnovers. The fourth goal was a result of a counter-attack after the Avs lost a battle in the offensive zone. Despite the number of mistakes from the home team, Colorado still entered the third period down just one goal.
“To me the biggest thing was we had half our team not show up to play,” Avs coach Jared Bednar said. “I can pick apart a lot of that game that I didn’t like but when it comes down to it, they were as a team engaged, ready to go. We had a little bit of a slow start and weren’t ready to engage and compete the way we needed to, to win the hockey game.”
Example; the fifth goal from the Stars came after a poor decision from Avalanche defenseman Nikita Zadorov in the defensive zone. The towering Russian blueliner had an opportunity to use his stick to break up the play but instead chose to go for a big hit. The puck trickled away as a result and was picked up by Stars forward Jason Dickinson who fed his teammate Roope Hintz for the goal.
“Dallas is a good team they wouldn’t be here if they weren’t a good team,” Avs captain Gabe Landeskog said. “But a lot of what happened today was self-inflicted. We didn’t get up to the standard that we have to play at, at this point in the season. We have to be a lot better, no doubt.”
Bednar added: “I did not like our D-core tonight. I did not like a lot of our middle-six wingers. We had a couple of workers in the bottom six but we did not have enough people playing. You might be able to get away with one or two passengers at this time of the year but you’re not getting away with any more than that. Not against a team like Dallas. So that’s on us and as me as a head coach.”
MacKinnon recorded two goals and an assist and finished with a plus-3 in 24:02 of ice time, including 10:15 in the third period. His linemates Landeskog and Mikko Rantanen combined for three points and a plus-3 rating.
“As a line we played well,” MacKinnon said. “We were tight to each other we made life easy. Mikko and Gabe did a great job forechecking and creating turnovers. I felt like we kind of put our foot in the water and just wanted to see how they would play versus how we need to play. It’s going to be a tough series. They got to beat us three more times and we’re going to be well prepared for Game 2.”
The Avs lost starting goalie Philipp Grubauer in the second period. The German leaned to the right in an attempt to block a shot that went wide of the net and fell to the ice on what seemed like a routine play. Grubauer was helped off the ice by a trainer and a teammate and was unable to apply weight to his left leg.
He was replaced by backup Pavel Francouz, who played the final 33:30, making 18 saves and was credited with the loss.
While an exact prognosis and timetable of Grubauer’s injury has yet to be announced, Bednar confirmed that Francouz will likely be the starter for the foreseeable future. Francouz recorded a 27-save shutout against the Stars during the round-robin. It was his only start against a team that defeated Colorado in each of their four meetings during the regular season.
“For sure it’s different if you go in, in the middle of the game,” Francouz said. “But as a backup goalie you have to be ready to play and that’s why I’m here.”
Veteran defenseman Erik Johnson was hurt in the first period and skated gingerly off the ice just as Dallas took a 2-1 lead — a lead they would not relinquish for the rest of the evening.
The defenseman returned in the second period only to leave the game again and spend the entire third period on the Avalanche’s bench despite not taking a shift.
“Erik tweaked something,” Bednar said of his assistant captain. “He thought he could go and tried it and wasn’t able to do that. He wanted to come out and try to help on the bench and do what he could as one of the leaders of our hockey club.”
Going into the series, the Avalanche were expected to be the higher-scoring team. The Stars had the third-least goals in the NHL before the pause and struggled in the earlygoing of the August restart. But after falling behind 2-1 in their first round series against Calgary, the Stars won three straight, scoring 14 goals in the process before today’s offensive performance agains the Avalanche.
“I thought they came out hard no doubt,” Landeskog said of the Stars. “Towards the end of that Calgary series it looked like they came into their own and started playing better than what they showed in the round-robin. But I think that’s the case at anytime of this point of the season. The further you go the better the teams are going to get. You have to bring your best every night and we sure didn’t tonight.
Colorado’s Vladislav Namestnikov was reinserted into the lineup after Matt Calvert was deemed unfit to play. Calvert had played a majority of the playoffs on the fourth line alongside Pierre-Edouard Bellemare and Matt Nieto. It was the first game he’s missed since before the March 12 pause.
“It happens,” Landeskog said of Calvert, Grubauer and Johnson’s injuries. “It’s just a matter of how we respond as a group. It’s not more than that. It sucks seeing guys go down. Everybody that’s in that lineup is there for a reason and when guys go down there’s a hole to fill. But it’s a next man up mentality. It’s something we’ve dealt with in the past and we’re just going to keep moving forward. Hopefully those guys can get back as soon as possible and get healthy. But we know we’re a good enough team to win with a couple of guys out of the lineup.”
