After Alex Tanguay contributed a goal and an assist to Colorado’s 3-2 win over Calgary on Saturday night at the Pepsi Center, the Avalanche has 13 games remaining, plus ground to make up and several teams to jump over to secure a Western Conference playoff berth.
It’s daunting, both because of the points involved and a stretch-run schedule that includes the next five on the road and only five more at home.
But while a case can be made that this team’s regression after a startling 2013-14 season has been disappointing, this also is undeniable: Colorado hasn’t packed it in. With defenseman Erik Johnson unavailable the past six weeks and forward Nathan MacKinnon out since last week, amid other injuries, Colorado has gone 10-4 in its past 14 games.
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Semyon Varlamov had 29 saves Saturday as the Avalanche (32-26-11) knocked off the Flames in front of Colorado’s 10th home sellout of the season. Ryan O’Reilly and John Mitchell also scored for the Avalanche.
Saturday’s results moved Winnipeg back into the second of the two Western Conference wild-card spots, and at 75 points, the Avalanche is five behind the Jets.
“We always believed in ourselves and the mindset of our players was, ‘Let’s give ourselves a shot at it,'” Colorado coach Patrick Roy said of the playoff chase. “Our guys have been playing hard, practicing hard and … being ready every time we touch the ice.”
Calgary’s loss was the surprising Flames’ first in regulation in March after they had scored 28 goals in going 5-0-1 in their previous six games, and they had played the night before in Calgary, beating the Maple Leafs 6-3.
“Tonight was crucial, it’s a team we’re battling with, so we’ll take it,” Tanguay said of the Flames, who at the end of the night were precariously in third place in the Pacific Division, which would be a guaranteed playoff spot.
The Saturday game was scoreless until Colorado scored twice in 107 seconds midway through the second period. First, Tanguay got his 19th goal of the season on a power play at 9:40. From slightly below the goal line to Calgary goalie Karri Ramo’s right, Tanguay shot the puck off Ramo’s pad and in.
“We were buzzing in their zone on the PP for a little while,” Tanguay said. “Sometimes the goalie is like everybody else, he gets a little tired and I saw he was off his angle. With the amount of goals we’ve been scoring on the power play, we need to score some goals and we were due to get a bounce coming our way. Fortunately, for us, it went in.”
Then O’Reilly took a pass from Tanguay, broke in on Ramo and beat the Flames goalie to the short side to put the Avs up 2-0.
The Flames were within 2-1 after former Avs winger David Jones got credit for the goal at 3:54 of the third, when Mikael Backlund’s pass went off his skate and past Varlamov. Only 28 seconds later, Mitchell made a nifty move and scored from the right circle to put Colorado back up by two. But the Flames’ Lance Bourna beat Varlamov at 5:48 to make it 3-2.
With a key penalty kill after Jan Hejda went off for interference at 12:05, the Avalanche managed to hang on. The Flames were 0-3 with the man advantage, and Colorado has killed off 33 of opponents’ last 35 power plays. The Avalanche went into Saturday’s games seventh in the league on the penalty kill, at 84.1 percent.
“Brad Stuart was phenomenal,” Roy said of the veteran Avalanche defenseman. “I know he doesn’t have (one of the) stars because we’re looking at stats, scores and stuff like this, but he was really good. He blocked a lot of shots, he was physical and he played really good on the PK. I thought it was a great team effort. It was a good moment to have a solid game like we had.”
Said Varlamov: “The guys did really well in front of me, especially boxing out the players very well. I could see most of the shots, which is important for me.”
With Colorado off until facing the Coyotes in Arizona on Thursday, the Avalanche won’t have opportunities to add to its point total in the next four days while other teams involved in the chase do. It comes out to 82 games in the end for everyone, of course, but that wait could be agonizing.
