The Colorado Avalanche erased an early two-goal hole in a hurry Tuesday night, flipping the game on its head in the second period after a rough opening 20 minutes against the Pittsburgh Penguins.
Artturi Lehkonen got Colorado going, and Gabe Landeskog and T.J. Hughes followed with goals as the Avalanche turned a shaky start into a 3-2 lead. But that turnaround came only after Pittsburgh had already made them pay for two defensive breakdowns in a span of just 29 seconds.
Colorado’s first period was all about Mackenzie Blackwood trying to keep the damage manageable. He stopped Nick Robertson on an early backhand chance from the low slot, then turned away Evgeni Malkin when the Penguins forward tried to wrap one around the net about two and a half minutes later.
Even after that, the Avalanche had a break around the 5:30 mark when T.J. Hughes appeared to slash Pittsburgh center Ben Kindel’s leg right in front of an official, but no call came.
The pressure eventually broke through anyway. Malkin opened the scoring by stopping up and catching Fedor Svechkov flat-footed, creating room to shoot while Sam Malinski battled for position in front. With Malinski screening Blackwood, the puck got through for a 1-0 Pittsburgh lead.
Just 29 seconds later, the Penguins struck again. Josh Manson had drifted too high in the defensive zone and lost his balance as he tried to recover, leaving Sidney Crosby and Bryan Rust with open ice on a two-on-one. Crosby set up Rust, who buried the tap-in to make it 2-0.
Colorado looked disjointed from there. The Avalanche had trouble holding possession, gave up dangerous shorthanded looks, and came away from the period fortunate not to surrender again. Once Novak returned, Gavin Brindley was called for interference, sending Colorado back to the penalty kill, though the Avalanche got through it.
By the first intermission, Pittsburgh had a 2-1 edge and a 14-5 shot advantage. Lehkonen’s goal had given Colorado a spark, but the Avs still needed more than that to settle the game down.
They got it almost immediately after the restart. Lehkonen scored again just 25 seconds into the second period, banging in a rebound while Sidney Crosby was stiff arming him into the net.
On the very next play, Landeskog added his third goal of the campaign to put Colorado ahead 3-2. Nazem Kadri’s first shot was stopped by Arturs Silovs, but the puck drifted to the back door and Landeskog was there to clean it up.
The Penguins briefly had a chance to respond when Landeskog was sent off for interference on Spencer Stastney after a collision following an offensive-zone faceoff with just under eight minutes left in the period. But Pittsburgh’s power play didn’t last long, because Kindel was then whistled for slashing, putting both teams at four skaters apiece.
Colorado made that situation count. With 5:03 left in the period, MacKinnon found T.J. Hughes for a low-slot tap-in, and the rookie scored his first career NHL goal.
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