Good & Bad: Coyle Scores SO Winner To Complete Avalanche’s Comeback Over Vegas

DENVER — For the fourth season in a row, the Avalanche have reached 100 points. And they’ve got three games remaining to add to it, and attempt to become one of two teams to potentially get 50 wins in each of the last four years.

Colorado trailed by two goals on Tuesday but climbed back to defeat the Vegas Golden Knights 3-2 in a shootout at Ball Arena. The Avs are 48-27-4 with three games left before the regular season ends.

Goaltender Scott Wedgewood was a perfect 3-for-3, and Charlie Coyle scored in the third round to secure the win.

“Sometimes it just doesn’t go your way to start, you go down a few goals,” Coyle said. “It’s all about what you do from that point on.”

The road team did not dress Jack Eichel, Alex Pietrangelo, or Nicolas Hague while the Avs were without Ross Colton, who joined a list of absent starters that includes Jonathan Drouin, Martin Necas, Samuel Girard, and Josh Manson.

Head coach Jared Bednar said Ross Colton is day-to-day with an upper-body injury.

Basically, neither team was willing to risk injury, and they played like it. They sat players who were even a little dinged up. Both teams already have a playoff spot locked up.

The Avs had goals from Valeri Nichushkin and Jimmy Vesey. Coyle had two assists to lead the way offensively, even without taking into account the shootout winner. He and Miles Wood extended their respective point streaks to three games.

“He comes as advertised. He’s a great two-way center and a big body,” Vesey said of Coyle, who has six points in his last three games. “Having him as a three-center, it just shows how deep we are.”

Vegas opened the scoring with a shorthanded goal from William Karlsson. He capitalized on an Avalanche turnover just 21 seconds into a delay-of-game penalty on Zach Whitecloud. The Knights killed that, and two other minors in the first period, to carry a 1-0 lead into the break.

They added another tally 40 seconds into the second period. But that was all they had left in the tank. Vegas had just 13 shots in the final two periods and overtime. Colorado had 28.

The comeback began with a power-play goal from Nichushkin that just barely crossed the goal line. Knights goalie Akira Schmid made a miraculous desperation rebound save, but the replay later showed that the puck, while in his glove, fully crossed the line. The play was reviewed and deemed a goal.

Colorado started to dominate from that point on. Vesey’s tally came during an outburst of shots. He jumped off the bench and squeaked the puck passed Schmid to make it 2-2. Both Coyle and Wood assisted on the goal, giving the third line yet another goal.

Each team had three shots in OT but couldn’t score. That included 45 seconds of a 4-on-3 PP for the Knights to close out the extra frame. Vegas finished 0-for-4 on the man-advantage. Colorado was 1-for-4.

Good: Charlie Coyle, Shootout King

Coyle is finally producing in regulation. But in the shootout, this isn’t the first time he’s carried the Avs to victory. For a guy who’s only played 16 games with Colorado, it’s impressive that two of the Avalanche’s four shootout winners involved Coyle scoring a big goal.

This must be part of that “as-advertised” game that Vesey was talking about. Some players have what it takes to score those shootout goals. It doesn’t always have to be the guys at the top of the lineup.

Bad: Another Shorthanded Tally Against

Following the Karlsson tally, the Avalanche have now given up seven shorthanded goals against, and quite a few have been getting past them in recent games.

Sure, it’s that time of the season where a playoff spot is locked in and the third seed is all but guaranteed, as is a matchup against the Dallas Stars. But that doesn’t change the fact that the habits should be better than this. At least that’s what Bednar has been preaching over the past week.

You don’t want to make a habit of this.