Breaking Down: Avs/Kings, Game #48

The Avs laid the Brazil on the Kings with a 7-1 win Saturday afternoon in a must-win situation. Two divisional games left before the big break so they’ll have to replicate that effort to gain some momentum for the last 2 months of the season.

Projectile Lineup

Ryan Graves was sent back to the Eagles at the end of the road trip. Tyson Jost was also sent to Loveland to get his game back together ahead of the break. Patrik Nemeth returned to the lineup after a bout with illness, Barbs took a seat to accommodate. Gabe Bourque also returned to the lineup after being scratched for the road trip. Varly started his 5th in a row.

Scratch: Barbs
Injured: Kamenev (shoulder)

Team Stats

The Avs came out playing sloppy and on their heels for the first half of P1 but got it together following a power play when Carl Soderberg continued his torrid play lately with a goal. From there they controlled play nicely until intermission. Score effects started early with a PPG 32 seconds into the 2nd frame. From there the Kings shot a lot and missed a lot while the Avs barely shot at all and put everything in the net. Six goals in a period is quite rare it turns out and the Avs were the first to complete that feat in several years, bonus – they did it on just 10 shots on goal. The 3rd period was frustration on LA’s part and the Avs rolling the bottom 3 lines exclusively until the final horn.

Tale of the tape at 5v5 was dead even at 47 for both squads. Let’s look at this another way, in periods 1 & 3 the Avs were +38/-18 and in period 2 they were +9/-29. Weird. Shot pace at 5v5 was a jammin’ 125 per hour.

Power play was 2-6 and PK was 3-4.

TOI

There were a lot of anomalies here from injuries and the game being out of reach from early in the 2nd on. Top 6 forwards at 5v5 were Soderberg, Wilson, Compher, Landy, Mack, Kerf and same in all situations with Nieto slotting in for Kerfoot. Mikko strained something after scoring a goal late in the 2nd, played another shift and didn’t return for P3. The staff assure us it was nothing serious and he’ll be good to go tomorrow. Mack and Landy played a couple token shifts early in the 3rd and rested afterwards. Dries was low man at 5v5 with 8:31 but played 14:21 overall. Kerf and Sven were low overall at just over 13 minutes total.

The defensive regime at 5v5 went Cole, Zadorov, Girard, Barrie, Nemeth, Johnson. In all situations it was Big Z (25), Cole (23+), Sam (22), Nemeth (21+), Barrie (21+) and EJ (2). EJ left after getting a puck in the face a few minutes into the game and didn’t return. No guidance yet on the severity.

Individual

Besides the fact they won like they were supposed to, the best thing to take out of this was that the Avs got some frustration out and played they way they need to if they want a playoff spot. It’s a miracle Colorado is still 3rd in the Central Division after the last 6 weeks but it’s time to take that and run. Right now they are 5 points behind last year’s pace, which was barely wild card level then. Receive the gift.

Burgundy Narrative Metric

– “Best guys being your best guys” gets a (+) everyone was best
– Quality vs Quantity gets a (+) finally some quality to go along with the quantity
– Power Play Watchability gets a (+) good practice
– The Dreaded Turtle gets a (+) 2nd period was all turtle but they dictated play all 3rd
– Starting Goalie Battle% gets a (+) nice job by Varly
– Referee Oppression Index gets a (+) the refs were just passengers

Total: +5¾

Next up

Preds on Monday afternoon, start coming up with work excuses now.

Thanks as always to the NHL and Natural Stat Trick for numbers and visuals