TAMPA — One violent outburst from a Colorado Avalanche player with his stick wasn’t enough. It was that kind of night on Florida’s Gulf Coast.
The Avalanche hoped to cap off a perfect four-game road trip. It had to settle for a successful one, albeit with an embarrassing finale, instead.
Tampa Bay outclassed Colorado in every phase Monday night en route to a 8-2 washout at Amalie Arena.
“I thought we had a great road trip. It just sucks it ended like this,” Avs center Nathan MacKinnon said. “Everything went in and we couldn’t do anything to stop it.”
The Lightning scored five times in the first period, prompting Miles Wood to smash his stick as he was exiting the bench area. One of the broken pieces hit coach Jared Bednar, who was walking not far behind him.
Brandon Hagel had five assists for the Lightning. He had four in the first period, which tied an NHL record.
When Tampa Bay pinged the puck around with little resistance on a power play in the second period, eventually netting an easy goal that Alexandar Georgiev had no chance on, the fiery Colorado goaltender broke his stick off the crossbar and then hurled it off the glass behind him.
“Listen, they’re frustrated,” Bednar said. “Probably upset with themselves, one another, everyone. I don’t blame them for having emotion and not liking the way the game was going. It was 5-1, 6-1 at the time. It is what it is. They’ll get past it.”
Justus Annunen started the game for the Avalanche, but did not last long. For the second in three starts, he was pulled after allowing three goals.
Annunen didn’t have much of a chance on the first one after defenseman Calvin de Haan bumped Lightning forward Mikey Eyssimont into him as the shot from Nick Perbix was arriving. The Finnish goalie should have had the next two, so he came out of the game 10:03 of the opening period.
The 24-year-old goalie re-entered the game to start the third period, and allowed goals on each of the first two shots he faced before stopping the final eight of the game.
Another rough performance against a good team is part of a larger trend for Annunen. Since the start of last season, he has played seven times against either a team that made the playoffs (last season) or is in position to be there this year. His save percentage in those games is .854.
That number is being helped greatly by Game 82 last year, when the Edmonton Oilers sat nearly all of their best players. Take that one out, and his save percentage drops to .825. It is still a small sample size, but his attempts to earn Bednar’s trust and more playing time against the better teams in the league have not gone well.
The Avs did not play better after Georgiev replaced him.
“No one is happy with the way we played tonight,” Bednar said. “I think a lot of guys were prepared to work and to compete, but our brains were not turned on. That turns into just chasing the game all over the place and the execution got bad.
“Just one of those nights.”
Tampa Bay moved the puck at will on the power play, scoring on both of its opportunities. The Lightning scored on a 2-on-1 shorthanded after a Nathan MacKinnon turnover near the left point.
Rookie Ivan Ivan had his fourth goal of the season at 8:56 of the first period. It was a rebound after a Valeri Nichushkin shot. Ivan scored again early in the third period when his shot went off the left post, off another player and back into the net. He now has five goals this season.
Colorado Avalanche goaltender Alexandar Georgiev (40) makes a save against Tampa Bay Lightning left wing Brandon Hagel (38) during the second period of an NHL hockey game Monday, Nov. 25, 2024, in Tampa, Fla. (AP Photo/Jason Behnken)
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Ivan was one of the few bright spots, but he was only playing on a line with Nichushkin because Jonathan Drouin did not play in this game because of an upper-body injury.
“It felt like at some points our bodies wanted to do the right thing, but the execution was just bad,” Avs defenseman Cale Makar said. “We were just slower than them to every puck. That was kind of the way tonight went.”
This was still a successful road trip. The Avalanche won three of four, including one against the second-best team in the East and one against the defending Stanley Cup champions (Florida).
That doesn’t absolve what happened here, but the Avs may be able to shrug it off as a bad night at the end of an otherwise strong trip. The schedule doesn’t get any easier, with three games in four nights against a trio of elite teams (Vegas, at Dallas, Edmonton) coming up.
They will need to prevent more goals, and smash fewer sticks to win those games.
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