Rob Blake’s return to Denver went about as well as Jose Theodore’s did in Montreal.
Just as Theodore did Saturday against his former team, Blake fished a lot of pucks out of the net Monday night in the Avalanche’s 6-1 victory over Blake’s new team, the Los Angeles Kings.
Blake was on the ice for all six Avalanche goals, finishing a minus-3. After the game he wasn’t happy about the performance by his new team, which has won only three of its first 10 games.
“There was no competition there tonight,” Blake said. “You can have slow starts, but you’ve got to compete. We got ourselves in penalty trouble and they score three 5-on-3s, then we think that we should play a different style and maybe try and open it up with them?
“Well, the next three shifts they scored three more goals on 3-on-2s. So, you want to play that way, we’re going to be behind the 8-ball again.”
The Avs broke open the game in the second period on consecutive power-play goals and scored five overall in the period to rout the Kings and former Avs coach Marc Crawford. The game was played in front of 17,284, the second straight non-sellout at the Pepsi Center.
The Avs (4-3-2) have won three of the past four games after consecutive home losses.
After allowing the opening goal to the Kings’ Derek Armstrong, the Avs got the next six against goalie Dan Cloutier. Milan Hejduk had two of them, with John-Michael Liles, Marek Svatos, Paul Stastny and Andrew Brunette getting the others.
The rookie Stastny added two assists for the Avs and has eight points (two goals) in his first nine NHL games.
“In camp, he proved that he’s a hockey player,” Avs coach Joel Quenneville said. “Tonight, I thought he had an outstanding game in all areas of the game.”
Said Stastny: “You talk to the guys today, and two points is real big. You’ve got to get those points early in the season.”
The first three Avalanche goals came on 5-on-3 power-play advantages.
Liles opened the Colorado scoring at 8:47 of the first, and Hejduk and Svatos scored in the second 1:07 apart to make it 3-1 at the 2:32 mark. Hejduk’s and Svatos’ goals came courtesy of Kings veteran Craig Conroy, who took interference and unsportsmanlike penalties with 29 seconds left in the first.
The line of Stastny, Hejduk and Wojtek Wolski combined for eight points against the Kings. Blake’s return was greeted with something of a yawn. He drew neither loud cheers nor boos.
Avs goalie Peter Budaj played well, especially in the first period. He stopped 12-of-13 shots in the first 20 minutes, some of which were dangerous Kings chances. He wasn’t tested much after that.
“I think the second period, we played a really good period,” said Avs defenseman Patrice Brisebois, who had two assists and has four in the past two games. “Maybe on the other side, they were tired; they played (Sunday) night and maybe we took advantage of it. But I think the difference tonight was we played well without the puck.”
Staff writer Adrian Dater can be reached at 303-954-1360 or adater@denverpost.com.
