The Colorado Avalanche continued their six game road trip after losing their last two games to the New York Rangers and New Jersey Devils. To say that the Avalanche came out against the Carolina Hurricanes flat is putting it nicely. Martin Necas scored a hat trick in the first period, but Zach Parise and Samuel Girard came back with goals five seconds apart. Colorado struggled to put points on the board, even with a day off after the New Jersey game. Here are the takeaways from the 5–2 loss to the Hurricanes.
Zach Parise in burgundy and blue.
That is all.#GoAvsGo pic.twitter.com/KfxuU4t0P2
— x – Colorado Avalanche (@Avalanche) February 9, 2024
Takeaways
— Colorado kept trying to clear the puck in the center of the ice. One thing that I learned in hockey was to avoid clearing the puck through the center of the ice. Several defensemen threw the puck up the middle and it led to the Hurricanes having multiple chances on the net, one ending up in the back of it.
Martin Necas cashes in on Carolina's beautiful passing play for his second goal of the first period, 2-0 Canes!#CauseChaos pic.twitter.com/j8w3vzLlI9
— Hockey Daily 365 l NHL Highlights & News (@HockeyDaily365) February 9, 2024
— The Avalanche have been 0/12 on the power play so far on the road trip. In three games so far, Colorado has yet to score a power play goal. Every time tonight that anyone got the puck, the Hurricanes had a player on the man with the puck. Their sticks were in the passing lanes and the coverage was excellent. One thing that did not help was that Jonathan Drouin negated the power plays twice by taking penalties.
— Colorado is only halfway through the road trip and coach Jared Bednar had his best players on the ice for over 20 minutes. Mikko Rantanen had 27:02 of ice time and did not even register a point. Cale Makar played for almost 26 minutes, but was shut down as well and had a very scary moment in the second period. And for the second straight game, Nathan MacKinnon was shut down and skated over 24 minutes.
Cale Makar was slow getting to the bench after getting tied up with Jesper Fast#GoAvsGo pic.twitter.com/fzmOWwvorA
— Hockey Daily 365 l NHL Highlights & News (@HockeyDaily365) February 9, 2024
Conclusion
When the Avalanche get the puck carrier double teamed, they need to learn how to spread the love. Yes, MacKinnon does a lot of the offensive work but with him being shut down for the last two games, Colorado has to get the puck to other forwards. The defense needs to get back to their game of skating the puck out of the zone, not passing the puck out. Passing it out led to costly turnovers that left Georgiev out to dry. The Avalanche will play again on Saturday against the Florida Panthers.