Avalanche fans enjoyed their annual red-letter day at the .
Big games from (two goals, three points), Nathan MacKinnon (two goals) (two assists) and (two assists) on Monday carried the Avalanche to a 6-3 victory over the — its former Western Conference rival — in an MLK Day matinee at the Pepsi Center.
The Avs, who also got goals from and and strong goaltending from (22 saves), finished 3-0-2 in a five-game homestand that takes them into an 11-day break between games. Colorado (28-15-6) has 33 remaining games, beginning Feb. 1 at Philadelphia.
“Really nice way to go into the break,” said Makar, who logged a team-high 21:22 and regained the NHL rookie scoring lead with 37 points. “As a team, we’ve been just trying to figure things out, just play consistent every game, and I feel like through this home stretch we’ve been able to do that, for the most part.”
The Avs had gone 4-7-1 prior to the homestand.
“It’s important — you want to go out and enjoy the break. It feels like our team was under fire here, warranted or not, a week ago, 10 days ago, and here we are, it’s a five-game homestand and we go 3-0-2, points in all five,” Avs coach Jared Bednar said. “So I think it looks good on our team. They worked hard. They deserve it.”
Lowly Detroit (12-34-4) saw its winless streak stretch to five games (0-4-1). The Red Wings took a 1-0 lead into the second period and were looking strong in front of goalie Jimmy Howard, who made 18 first-period saves and stopped 32 of 34 shots after the second until Colorado got two early third-period goals from Kadri and Nieto to blow the game open.
Howard, who fell to 2-18-2 on the season, was looking for his first win since Oct. 29 against Edmonton.
MacKinnon’s two goals gave him 30 for the season, tying Joe Sakic for a franchise-record three-consecutive 30-goal seasons. MacKinnon became the fourth 30-goal scorer this season, joining Boston’s David Pastrnak (37), Washington’s Alex Ovechkin (34) and Auston Matthews (34) of Toronto.
Kadri’s first goal tied it 1-1 and came on the power play, but the Avs otherwise continued to struggle on the man-advantage, going was 1 for 5. They are now 2 for 25 in their last eight games.
“That was a momentum changer for us, just being able to execute on the power play and finally just buy one,” Kadri said. “I think we’ve been getting a lot of opportunities and we felt like it was coming soon and it was definitely a big goal for us.”
Footnotes. Tyson Jost assisted on Nieto’s goal and had five shots in what Bednar said was the best game of the season for the 21-year-old forward. … Colorado was an impressive 37-27 on faceoffs. … Former Avs defenseman Patrik Nemeth was a plus-3 for the Red Wings. … The Avs’ scratches were forward and defenseman . Donskoi, who is recovering from a concussion, missed his fifth consecutive game, but this one for precautionary reasons.
