Trading Places

Amazing. When the Colorado Avalanche and the San Jose Sharks last faced each other, Alexandar Georgiev was with the former, and Mackenzie Blackwood was with the latter. Over a month later, the two goalies were swapped for each other, as Colorado was looking to solve our goaltender problems. Interestingly, these two goalies were not in net during the first meeting between the clubs this season. In this matchup, they were.

This was the second game of the Pacific road trip, coming off a loss in Vancouver that saw us almost get blanked. The Avs received an early power play, and Valeri Nichushkin struck. Boy, did we need this one. Our power play had been MIA for almost two weeks; December 7 against Detroit (which was Georgiev's last start with the Avs) was the last time we scored on the power play. It was mostly quite following the goal, but some noise was made in the final 30 seconds. Jake Walman and Mikko Rantanen roughed each other, but Walman also roughed up Casey Mittelstadt, so that resulted in a power play for the Avs that spanned into the second period.

The PP was killed off, and the Sharks would gain some momentum after the kill. It led to Carl Grundstrom tying it up, and five minutes later, William Eklund made it 2-1 for San Jose. That goal was challenged, it was unsuccessful, leading to a Sharks power play that was killed off. We went back on the PP, but that resulted in nothing, and after 40 minutes, the Avs trailed 2-1. Something needed to be done in the third. The Avs did press in the beginning of the third period, but Parker Kelly's penalty gave SJ a PP; killed off. Avs had one of our own, and Rantanen snipes one that ties it up. An excellent start. Unfortunately, less than half a minute after the game was tied, the Sharks received a power play. Thankfully, that was killed off, but five seconds later, they called the most bullshit penalty I had ever seen. Sharks player simply falls on his face, but they say "tripping" on Nichushkin. Seriously?

So that power play gets killed off, and just 12 seconds after the kill, Joel Kiviranta snipes one in. Puck don't lie. So the Avs get the lead back, and Kivi liked scoring so much that he decided to do it again two minutes later to make it 4-2. Georgiev was pulled for the extra attacker, Avs had a couple of attempts at the empty net that went wide, but it was all good.

Thank goodness for that third period! Three goals in the third, two of them from Joel Kiviranta, and the Avs left Northern California victorious. Even better, we had power play goals--two of them! We needed something to go right on that PP after nearly two weeks of nothing, including giving up a shorthanded goal in Vancouver. Hopefully this starts a big tear for the Avs that sees us move up the standings and end up with a prime position, but for now, we'll just take this one game at a time.

The Avs will be back to work on the next day against the Ducks in Anaheim, and after that, it's back at home against the Seattle Kraken; our last game before the holiday break.

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