It’s not the biggest accomplishment Nathan MacKinnon would like to celebrate this year, but it’s certainly one he deserves.
MacKinnon became the fourth player to record 500 career points with the Avalanche on Tuesday in a 3-2 victory over the Los Angeles Kings.
“It’s cool,” MacKinnon said of his achievement. “I wish I got that sooner but it’s a cool milestone.”
MacKinnon, 25, set up Mikko Rantanen on the power play for the eventual game-winning goal in the second period to help Colorado (2-1-0) open its four-game road trip with a victory. It was his second point of the evening after recording the secondary assist on Colorado’s first goal from Brandon Saad.
Playing in his 528th career game, MacKinnon joins Avalanche legends Joe Sakic (1,015), Peter Forsberg (805) and Milan Hejduk (705) as the only players to accomplish the feat since relocating from Quebec in 1995. Sakic and Forsberg also played for the Quebec Nordiques before they relocated to Colorado.
MacKinnon is the seventh player in franchise history to reach 500 points.
“Five-hundred points in the NHL is not an easy thing to achieve,” MacKinnon said. “But I’ve had some great players play with me along the way.”
MacKinnon was drafted first overall by Colorado in 2013 and he is the first player from that class to reach 500 points. He won the Calder Trophy as the NHL’s rookie of the year in 2013-14.
After enduring multiple seasons of point regression following his 64-point rookie campaign, MacKinnon has scored 294 points in his last 228 games since October 2017.
The puck movement 🙌#GoAvsGo pic.twitter.com/iyERkCSoPS
— x – Colorado Avalanche (@Avalanche) January 20, 2021
Game recap
Colorado jumped out to a 3-0 lead in the second period thanks to two quick power-play goals. Defenseman Devon Toews scored on the man-advantage 1:55 before Rantanen’s tally made it 3-0.
“They couldn’t have come at a better time for us,” Avs coach Jared Bednar said of the power-play goals. “We were skating and using our speed and trying to create. We caught them and drew a couple of penalties. You need your power play to step up and we were able to come up with two big ones at a key time.”
Colorado’s first goal from Brandon Saad was his first with the Avs.
The Kings fought back in the third period, scoring twice to pull within one. The goal from Andreas Athanasiou at 7:09 of the third ended the shutout bid for goaltender Philipp Grubauer.
Grubauer, who shutout the St. Louis Blues on Friday, went 113 minutes without surrendering a goal. In that time, the Avs scored 11 goals — the most consecutive goals since the team relocated to Colorado.
Footnotes
Colorado dressed 11 forwards and seven defensemen. … The Avs traded defenseman Ian Cole hours before the game and called up newcomer Dennis Gilbert from the taxi squad to make his season debut in his place. … Veteran Erik Johnson also made his season debut after missing the first week of the season with a positive COVID-19 test. Bednar said the decision to play seven defensemen was to help Johnson ease into a full-time role. Johnson played 12:29. … The Avs were without forward Andre Burakovsky and goaltender Pavel Francouz, who Bednar said are both day-to-day with injuries suffered in practice Monday. Goalie Hunter Miska was called up from the taxi squad to backup Grubauer. … Toews scored in consecutive games for the first time in his career and played a team-high 26:12.