Breaking Down: Avs/Isles, Game 38

The Avs left the 1st period with a 1-goal lead then completely overwhelmed the Islanders in the 2nd period. We got a rare look at what the Avs can look like when everything works and the opponent has no answers. Maybe it’s not even that rare anymore now that it’s happened a few times this season, which is a good feeling to have.

Team Stats

The 2nd period is about as dominant as it’s possible to be. I’m not even sure that the Avs had something like this happen to them during last year’s malaise. Let’s take a look at the 5v5 numbers just for the grins, also remembering that 2 of the goals were on the PP

Corsi 27-9, 81%
Shots on goal 19-2, 90%
Scoring chances 18-1, 95%
High-danger 12-0, 100%

Stunning. There have been whole games where they haven’t come close to that. In their last loss vs Arizona they had 2 high-danger chances total.

Special teams had another good night. The PK continued it’s perfect run up to 33 and no goals allowed in 11 games. The PP went 2 for 4 thanks to a pair of goals 2 minutes apart by Captain Gabe.

TOI

Thanks to score effects there are lots of anomalies but it gave opportunities to some guys that needed some experience. The defensive regime at 5v5 went Nemeth, Barberio, Johnson, Zadorov, Girard and Mironov with a whopping 12 minutes in his first game back from the AHL. Overall it went EJ, Nemo, Girard, Z, Barbs then Miro.

The top 6 forwards were Soderberg, Comeau, Nieto, Jost, Bourque & Wilson at 5v5 and Landy, Jost, Comeau, Mack, Carl, Mikko overall. Andrighetto ended up low man after his injury late in the 3rd. It’s nice to see a game where Bednar was able to roll 4 lines all night. Everyone ended up within 4 minutes of each other.

Individual

– The Soderberg line set the tone in P2 and they were the impetus for all that followed. Their forecheck was relentless and the Isles couldn’t do anything against it. Carl was 3rd star of the game, which I thought was selling him a bit short, with a goal and assist. Nieto had the Avs second goal and Comeau added an assist.

– Tyson Jost played 17:14, four and a half minutes more than his season average, and saw time on the 1st PP unit in place of the injured JT Compher. It was encouraging to see the rookie take advantage of an opportunity and show what he can do. If nothing else this can build some confidence, both his and the staff’s in him. He led the team in shot attempts and SOG and his line with Wilson/Bourque was effective all evening.

– Landy & Mack were the 1st & 2nd Stars of the game even though they weren’t the primary drivers of the charge at first. Mack is now 5th in the league in scoring and 9th in assists. Both have 16 goals, good for a 20th place tie. BAM.

– Sam Girard took over the QB spot on PP1 and really shined there last night, collecting assists on both Landeskog goals. Besides that he played more than he has since he was slotted with EJ after the trade and handled it just fine. He had a strong showing in the 3rd with 7 shifts and 6:51 in even strength time.

– I don’t know how much we should take from a game like this about a defensive defenseman but Andrei Mironov looked pretty good after some seasoning in San Antonio. He got a few more shifts than average, played some with Big Z in the 3rd and looked far better than Anton Lindholm has recently. If he can back that up between now and when Tyson Barrie returns then he might have finally earned a spot on the team.

Burgundy Narrative Metric

– “Best guys being your best guys” gets a (+) Everyone was a best guy last night
– Corsi gets a (+) 56%, you betcha
– Power Play gets a (+) Sam’s the man
– Turtle gets a (-) no way to avoid this one up by 5 the whole 3rd
– Varly% gets a (n/a) I guess Bernie was good, never saw him
– Referee Oppression Index gets an (even) but throwing Doug Weight out of the game was hilarious. Haven’t seen that in forever.

Total: +99

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The Avs have what should be a bit of a tougher matchup vs the Jets tomorrow