Reagan Smith
Well… this game certainly had just about everything. Fans for the first time, a first period hat trick, a dislodged skate, and even a broken pane of glass. That pane of glass was even replaced within a span of one minute and 26 seconds of real-time. So someone needs to buy the ice crew a beer, they deserve it. All of this on the way to an Avalanche 9-3 thrashing of the Arizona Coyotes. Overall, tonight was probably the weirdest games I have ever seen from whistle to whistle.
Obviously, the focal point of the night will be on Joonas Donskoi. Donskoi netted his second career hat trick before I even had a chance to finish my dinner. How fast did he score his three goals? Well, he did it in 3:27 of ice time and just 7:31 into the entire game. Makes you wonder if Donkey used to work at Jimmy Johns because that three-goal delivery was freaky fast.
“We came out to play and we had a good start,” Donskoi said. “It’s just fun to play on this line right now with [Tyson] Josty and Val [Nichuskin]. I know that they’re going to work their ass off every shift… I got a couple of bounces and rebounds and was able to put them in the back of the net. Playing with those two guys is super fun right now.”
However, Donskoi’s hatty wasn’t the fastest hat trick in franchise history. That title belongs to Alain Cote of the Quebec Nordiques when he scored his in just 2:17 of ice time against the Boston Bruins. It is, however, the fastest hat trick to begin a game in franchise history.
Donskoi has scored 15 goals this season, good enough for second behind Rantanen and puts him one shy of his career-high (set last year). He’s doing all of this while playing on the third line.
“You have to have depth scoring,” Avalanche head coach Jared Bednar said. “…Donny is one of those guys. He’s always doing the right thing and trying to play the right way. Sacrificing whatever he has to in order to help the team win. So, I love seeing him get rewarded.”
To use a ridiculously bad and overused pun, the Avalanche laid an Avalanche of goals on Yotes’ netminders Adin Hill (4) and Ivan Prosvetov (5). Tonight was Prosvetov’s first NHL minutes, too. What a harsh welcome into the league it was.
Pierre-Edouard Bellemare, Andre Burakovsky, Gabriel Landeskog and Mikko Rantanen all joined Donskoi on the goal fest. In fact, Landeskog and Burakovsky loved it so much, they scored twice.
From an offensive perspective, it was a game to remember. 14 different players recorded a point. It was especially a first period that will stick in the minds of fans for years to come. Primarily for the few thousands of frontline workers who were in attendance for the first time in over a year.
“It was a lot of fun,” Bednar said. “You could tell our guys were excited by it by the way we came out. It’s just so much different playing in front of fans. And we miss it as a team. We wanted to put our best foot forward and I thought we did that in the first period.”
Ball Arena opens its doors to the general public for Avalanche games on Friday against the St. Louis Blues.
The scoreline is yet another indicator of how scary the Avalanche team can be when they’re hot. And they are HOT. 10-0-2 in their last 12 games, while Rantanen scored 25 points in the month of March. Landy had 24. More interesting stats in the “Milestones and things to note” area, below!
If there was any weak point in the Avalanche’s play tonight, I think the finger would be pointed at the defense. I think this was the first time in a long while that the blueliners looked… well, human. Arizona’s opening goal on the first shot of the game from Michael Bunting came after Bunting blew past Cale Makar who seemed to have lost track of where the puck was. Meanwhile, the Coyote’s third and final goal of the evening came after Bunting pick-pocketed Brandon Saad via poke check which set up Connor Garland for a quick wrister.
There were also times where the defense just wasn’t set up to defend well in the zone and were chasing for periods of time. Some defensive play tonight just looked a bit careless. Obviously, there will be times where certain aspects of play just doesn’t look as up to snuff as it normally does. Tonight was one of those nights, I think, for the D-core. It was a perfect night for it to happen, given the final score.
Some other aspects from tonight’s game to note: Logan O’Connor never appeared on the bench from the second period onward. Coach Bednar noted that it was a lower-body injury and that it was muscle related. Nathan MacKinnon’s helmet throw should garner some scrutiny from the Department of Player Safety, as well. I wouldn’t be surprised to see a fine arise from that.