The moment after Nate Dogg regulated, Gabriel Landeskog raised his arms to the Ball Arena roof and looked up in complete, utter relief.
Nathan MacKinnon wristed home the game-tying goal with 1:23 left in the third period of Game 5 against the Wild on Wednesday, to the slimmest of windows on the top left shelf to beat Minnesota goalie Jesper Wallstedt.
The score, which came in a six-on-five in an extended shift for Colorado’s top line with Avs goalie Scott Wedgewood pulled, completed Colorado’s comeback from a 3-0 deficit. It forced overtime in the Avs’ 4-3 victory that was capped by Brett Kulak’s game-winning goal in the series-clincher to send Colorado to the Western Conference Final.
“I was exhausted to say the least,” Landeskog said of his reaction to MacKinnon’s goal. “Just such a special player, making a special shot, at such a clutch moment.”
MacKinnon’s shot also left forward Parker Kelly, who was watching from the bench, in disbelief.
“Unbelievable,” Kelly said. “I mean, it didn’t really look like there was much (space) there… and you just see it kind of hit the top of the net. Just, what a shot. Elite player, big-time player, gamer — thatap why they call him the Dogg, man. He shows up in those big moments. And we’re super fortunate to have him.”
MacKinnon got the puck in the left faceoff circle off a feed from Martin Necas, and the generational center had plenty of time to decide what to do with it. Wild defenseman Jake Middleton went down to the ice in front of MacKinnon to attempt to block a low shot, just before MacKinnon lasered the puck to the slimmest of spaces above Wallstedt’s right shoulder.
“I just saw a little daylight and I just threw it there,” MacKinnon said. “It doesn’t always go where you want it to. I’m happy it did then.”
MacKinnon’s seventh goal of the playoffs left Wild head coach John Hynes metaphorically shrugging his shoulders at the precision of a player who led the NHL with 53 goals in the regular season.
“It was a shot outside the dots from a bad angle,” Hynes said. “It was a heck of a shot by an unbelievable player. When you look at where it goes in, he had a pinpoint shot. (The Avs) had a net front, a bumper player, a backside player. We had all those areas covered, and MacKinnon made a heck of a shot.”
Landeskog said that at the time of MacKinnon’s goal, the Avs weren’t thinking about time ticking away toward a looming return trip to Minnesota for Game 6.
“(Our mindset was) just go,” Landeskog said. “We had a plan, six-on-five. Obviously, we were able to get some momentum (with Jack Drury’s goal a couple minutes earlier). We know those guys (for Minnesota) had been in for a little bit. They’ve been playing a lot all series. So we were able to find a way to get the puck in Nate’s hands.”
MacKinnon said the energy in the arena after his goal was a memorable moment in his career. And after he lit the lamp, the Avs were playing with house money heading into overtime, a flip of the script after Landeskog admitted the Avs were “shell-shocked” by the Wild taking a 3-0 lead in the first period. That early stumble resulted in head coach Jared Bednar pulling Mackenzie Blackwood from the net in favor of Wedgewood.
“I could definitely feel (the energy), and hear it,” MacKinnon said. “… It was a really cool moment. And obviously coming back from 3-0, we felt good going to overtime.”
With Wednesday’s third-period goal, MacKinnon has now scored in six straight games, the second-longest playoff streak Valeri Nichushkin (2024), Claude Lemieux (1997) and Joe Sakic (1996) are all tied for the record with seven straight.
