Unanswered

The Colorado Avalanche did not end the month of November on a good note. A bad loss in Dallas, and a worse loss at home against Edmonton--back-to-back losses against last year's Western Conference finalist. Our December starts out with a lot of traveling and a lot of miles. Five games on the road, all in the East. First off, a city that's familiar to one of our players: Buffalo. For Casey Mittelstadt, it's a homecoming. Mittelstadt was drafted by the Buffalo Sabres in 2017; played his whole career there alongside the likes of Evan Rodrigues and Jack Eichel, and it was during the deadline last season that Mittelstadt was dealt to the Avs for Bowen Byram, allowing Mittelstadt to have his first taste of the playoffs.

For Buffalo, the expectations were there for, well, something. The 2010-11 season was the last time that the Sabres reached the Stanley Cup Playoffs; the longest current playoff drought in the NHL. 13 years. Here's how long that is in the NHL. The Atlanta Thrashers were around for their last season before they moved to Winnipeg. The Boston Bruins won the Stanley Cup that season. There were six divisions in the NHL. Nathan MacKinnon was not in the NHL yet. Hell, neither was Gabriel Landeskog. So yeah, the Sabres need something to happen for them this season.

As for the Avs, we were looking to bounce back from those losses, and get December started right.

And then Tage Thompson made it 1-0 for the Sabres. So we were starting late once again. But it's only 1-0. Well, it was. Tage Thompson made it 2-0, and Byram had one of the assists against the team he won the Cup with. 11 seconds later, it was 3-0 thanks to JJ Peterka. And almost five minutes after that, Beck Malenstyn made it 4-0. The assist on that goal: Stanley Cup Champion (and denter) Nicolas Aube-Kubel. Four goals on eight shots. Alexandar Georgiev's night was done, and in came Scott Wedgewood. Not the way Wedgewood wanted to make his Avs debut, having to come in relief after his new team is down 4-0.

So that was the score after 20 minutes. This game was over... but not for the team you though it was over for.

Second period saw Nathan MacKinnon end two things: Ukko-Pekka Luukkonen's shutout bid, and a ten-game goal drought. The goal came early in the period, but unfortunately, it was the only one in the frame. Avs entered the third period down 4-1 and on the verge of another crippling defeat. However, Joel Kiviranta scored just 79 seconds in to the frame. While MacKinnon's goal was unassisted, Kiviranta's was helped by Calvin de Haan and Logan O'Connor. So it was a two goal game with a lot of time left to score at least two more. And just like that, at 4:30, O'Connor scored. Now it's a one goal game with a lot of time left. Despite Buffalo pressing, the Avs winning this became a reality, and it became more of reality three minutes later. MacKinnon struck again! Mikko Rantanen and Devon Toews assisted, and this game was tied!

I was getting flashbacks to last year, when we actually came back from down 4-0 against the Penguins to win it. Could we do it again? The Sabres were really trying to get that lead back, and the natives were getting very restless. Even as the time went down, something told me overtime was not going to happen, one way or the other. The clock reached the final five minutes, and at 15:38, Artturi Lehkonen, who knows a thing or two about game-winning goals, put it in. MacKinnon and de Haan assisted. The Avs led for the first time in the game! UPL ended up pulled for the extra attacker. The Sabres were close to tying it, but they would not. The Avs, after being down 4-0, won it!!

Last year, comeback wins like this were kinda of a thing for the Avs. We came back from 3-0 quite a bit, and of course, there's the 4-0 comeback I mentioned. We even came back from 3-0 in the playoffs once. This was absoutely wild. We gave up four goals in the first, because the first 20 minutes have never gone well for us this season. The Avs score five unanswered, including four in the third period! Nathan MacKinnon snapped a goal drought and started the comeback! We needed this one, because a loss would put us at .500 even after the first game in December. Now, there's some good hope for us to climb back into a favorable position. This is a win that teams like the Avs could eventually turn into a big winning tear.

Avs are up one in this five game Eastern swing, and next up, it's a trip to Raleigh to face the Carolina Hurricanes on Thursday!

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