Nazem Kadri finally found the finish the Colorado Avalanche had been waiting for.
After opening the season without a goal but still chipping in as a playmaker, Kadri snapped his scoring drought Friday night against the Tampa Bay Lightning, burying a power-play chance at 5:52 of the first period in a 3-0 Avalanche win at Ball Arena. The goal gave Colorado a 2-0 lead and ended a 10-game stretch in which Kadri had piled up seven assists without scoring.
The sequence came after Brandon Hagel was whistled for tripping at 5:09. Colorado needed just 43 seconds to cash in.
Rookie T.J. Hughes slid the puck to Kadri in the low slot, and the veteran forward beat Andrei Vasilevskiy with a snap shot.
It was a timely response from a power play that had been stuck in neutral early on. Entering the game, the Avalanche had gone 6-for-32 with the man advantage, an 18.75 percent clip.
Colorado had already set the tone before Kadri’s goal. Devon Toews scored 1:08 into the game, with Martin Necas and Nathan MacKinnon picking up the assists, and Kadri’s tally stretched that early edge into a more comfortable lead after back-to-back losses to Philadelphia and New Jersey.
The goal also nudged Kadri closer to a significant career marker. He came into the night two power-play goals shy of 100 for his NHL career, and Friday’s score was No.
- The 36-year-old had been getting his chances all along; he just hadn’t cashed them in.
Through 10 games, Kadri had 27 shots on goal, good for an average of 2.7 per game, while logging 20:20 of ice time a night. Colorado has kept leaning on him, even without the goals to show for it.
His return to the Avalanche earlier this year reunited him with the team where he delivered his best NHL season. In 2021-22, Kadri posted 28 goals and 59 assists for a career-high 87 points in 71 games. He followed that with seven goals and eight assists in 16 playoff games as Colorado won its third Stanley Cup.
One of those playoff goals is already etched into Avalanche memory. In Game 4 of the Stanley Cup Final, coming back from thumb surgery, Kadri scored at 12:02 of overtime to beat Tampa Bay 3-2 and push Colorado to a 3-1 series lead. The Avalanche went on to win the title in six games.
Friday’s goal came in a different setting, but it served the same basic purpose: a reminder that Kadri can still turn volume into damage. Colorado doesn’t need him to recreate his 2021-22 season. It does need him to keep finishing chances like this one.
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For a team always hunting for the next wave of help, that kind of production is enough to make Shilov worth tracking well beyond draft season. He is still in the development stage, of course, and any NHL timeline remains uncertain, but the early returns at least give Colorado something encouraging to follow as it looks ahead to what he might become down the road. [Read more 🡒]