After a frustrating Game 1 loss against the Vegas Golden Knights, the Colorado Avalanche are back in action again tonight, as they look to bounce back and even this series up in Game 2.
Colorado Avalanche
Game 1 was, in a word, frustrating for Colorado. Yes, Vegas is a good hockey team and they were incredibly opportunistic with their goals, but the Avs made it super easy for them to actually benefit from those opportunities, as they made a lot of mistakes defensively in that game, giving the Golden Knights maybe a bit
of an easier time than they would’ve had otherwise. Tonight, they’ll have to clean up those defensive mistakes to even this series.
There’s no greater storyline for Colorado than what’s the status of Cale Makar. He was a participant at morning skate, which is fostering some optimism that he can return to the lineup tonight. In net it still looks to be Scott Wedgewood despite the loss.
Projected Lineup
Artturi Lehkonen – Nathan MacKinnon – Gabriel Landeskog
Valeri Nichushkin – Brock Nelson – Martin Necas
Ross Colton – Nazem Kadri – Nic Roy
Parker Kelly – Jack Drury – Logan O’Connor
Devon Toews – Sam Malinski
Brett Kulak – Brent Burns
Jack Achan – Josh Manson
Scott Wedgewood
Mackenzie Blackwood
Vegas Golden Knights
As previously mentioned, the Golden Knights were very opportunistic in Game 1, and capitalized on the opportunities they got throughout the game. They were as advertised in this game, being strong defensively and overall frustrating to play against. Colorado did make a late push in Game 1 and showed that they’re capable of hanging with this team, they’ll just need to capitalize the way Vegas did to even this series.
No lineup changes are expected for Vegas, though Mark Stone did make the trip to Colorado but he’s still out indefinitely.
Projected Lineup
Ivan Barbashev – Jack Eichel – Pavel Dorofeyev
Brett Howden – William Karlsson – Mitch Marner
Brandon Saad – Tomas Hertl – Colton Sissons
Cole Smith – Nic Dowd – Keegan Kolessar
Brayden McNabb – Shea Theodore
Noah Hanafin – Rasmus Andersson
Ben Hutton – Dylan Coghlan
Carter Hart
Adin Hill
