Takeaways from Avalanche preseason game No. 4: This is why they got Nazem Kadri

When the Colorado Avalanche started overtime Sunday night, Nazem Kadri was there at center ice to take the faceoff. He won the draw back to Cale Makar, who fed Kadri down the left side for what proved an excellent scoring chance.

That’s the kind of thing we almost never saw last season on a team that was truly awful in overtimes and saw that cost them a lot of points in the standings (12, to be exact. Colorado’s OT record was 3-12). Partly, that’s because the Avs almost always started OT without possession of the puck, because their faceoff work was subpar.

Guys like Kadri are changing that.