Instant reaction from the Avalanche’s 4-0 win over the Dallas Stars in Game 4 of their first-round Stanley Cup Playoffs series.
1. Lan-dy! Lan-dy! Lan-dy!: What’s better than watching the captain return to the ice for the first time in three years? Watching Gabe Landeskog find the back of the net for the first time since June 20, 2022 — a span of 1,041 days. With 6:50 left in the second period, the Avalanche more or less put the game away when second-line center Brock Nelson zipped up the left side of the ice and found Landy all alone in the slot, a stride outside the left faceoff circle. The captain cocked his stick back and launched a wrister past Dallas goaltender Jake Oettinger to give the hosts a 3-0 lead and send Ball Arena into complete hysterics. Quite a homestand for the 32-year-old Swede, who celebrated his return to the NHL in Game 3 and his first goal after said return in Game 4.
2. Bednar’s tweaks paid off: Speaking of Landeskog, give Avs coach Jared Bednar credit for making lineup adjustments that got two struggling facets going again. Actually, it was more like two adjustments with the same guy, as the coach moved Landy from the third line to the second line to give that struggling crew a bit of a boost and No. 92 to the top power-play unit. End result? That second line with Val Nichushkin on the wing and Nelson at center scored for the first time this series. And at the end of the first period, the Avs closed a feisty stanza with a power-play goal, a missile off the stick of Nathan Mackinnon. That ended a 0-for-8 slump by the Avs with the extra man. Stars coach Pete DeBoer seemed to sense the mojo, too, pulling Oettinger to start the third period despite a decent showing to that point. Everybody’s seemingly setting the chess pieces up for Games 6 and 7 at this point.
3. Two-goal lead? Yes, sir!: You know how to prevent heartbreaking third-period deadlocks and, by proxy, heartbreaking overtime losses? Two-goal leads! We kid, but it’s amazing how much different the Avs look when they’ve got a cushion to play with. Nathan MacKinnon’s power-play laser past Oettinger on the power play with 23.4 seconds to go put the hosts up 2-0 just before the initial intermission and put the Stars in a hole. If it felt as if it had been a while, that’s because it was — the end of the first period was the Avs’ first multi-goal cushion in the series since the third stanza of Game 1. In that game, Colorado turned a 2-0 bulge into 3-1 — then 4-1 and, eventually, 5-1. Losing one-goal leads had threatened to become a theme against Dallas, but a fast start saw the Stars begin to tense up, instead of the other way ’round.
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