10 Takeaways: The Avalanche Finally Got the Playoff Path They Wanted

And that’s not to say the Wild would’ve won this series with them. The Avalanche were the deeper team — they had the experience and the pieces to likely beat Minnesota regardless of who was or wasn’t injured. But to do it in five games? They earned that.

The regular season doesn’t always matter, but this was an instance where it did. Just like in 2022.

10 Takeaways

1. This year’s Minnesota Wild never felt like they had the juice to beat the Avs. Even if they were healthy, I truly believe Colorado could have still ended this one quickly. And I say that because this series reminded me a lot of the Avalanche’s matchup against a deeper Dallas Stars in 2024.

Minnesota has done a great job of developing Matt Boldy and Brock Faber. It’s nice to see them retain Kirill Kaprizov, and the Quinn Hughes addition is a game-changer. They have a ton of star power at the top, but the depth wasn’t up to par with the Avs. That’s the part Bill Guerin has to figure out.

If you recall in 2024, the Avalanche were still without Gabe Landeskog and had lost (again) Valeri Nichushkin. In that double overtime loss in Game 6 that ended their season, Colorado kept trotting out the same guys over and over and basically played them into the ground while Dallas was able to roll four lines.

Minnesota was the 2024 Avs in this series. And in this game.

2. This is the eighth time in Avalanche franchise history that they are heading to the Western Conference Final. That’s eight appearances in 30 years.

As for the best part? It’s the first time they get there in just nine games. That’s a franchise record.

3. Kulak has played the most playoff games over the last five years in the NHL and had not scored a game-winner until Wednesday night. This was actually his first in 107 career postseason games. His postgame quote was great: “I’m not the guy everyone’s looking down the bench like, ‘alright, get out there and go win it for us.”

Speaking of postgames, this little snippet of him talking about getting to go to his daughter’s birthday party on Thursday is also pretty special.

4. The four game-winning goals for Colorado in this series: Nic Roy, Nazem Kadri, Parker Kelly, and Kulak. Talk about a sensational trade deadline for Chris MacFarland. The three guys he added to the main roster all had game-winners.

5. Another big reason why the Avalanche won this series? The power play got going. They had five goals on 13 opportunities over five games. That’s the best power play in the second round of the postseason so far.

6. I wonder how close Artturi Lehkonen and Sam Malinski are to returning. The fact that they both took part in that morning skate on Monday makes me believe it’s not a serious injury. But at the same time, I feel like Bednar had the luxury of giving them additional rest because they had a 3-1 series lead.

If the Avs lost this game, maybe they would’ve been back on Friday. I would imagine Malinski, if he could play through this ailment, would’ve been utilized more than the 3:35 Jack Ahcan played in Game 5. Ahcan played one 19-second shift in the second period, and did not see the ice at all in the third or in OT.

7. I asked Bednar in the morning about the added motivation of ending this series as soon as possible to get more time to rest. One person who I’m sure is going to appreciate that is Cale Makar. In Minnesota, I noticed Makar had a pretty large additional piece of padding under his equipment that was protecting his shoulder.

That was the first thing I thought of when he went to the locker room after that collision with Mats Zuccarello in the third period.

8. There was a comment a colleague of mine made in the second period. Something along the lines of “you can’t lose games when guys like Parker Kelly score.” This was obviously after Kelly had made it 3-1 just past the halfway mark of regulation.

When Jack Drury scored, he said the same thing again. Basically, when your depth gives you two big goals, you need the superstars to do the rest.

Nathan MacKinnon eventually tied it up, and Martin Necas set up the game winner. Both of those stars made those plays happen with an insane amount of skill.

9. Mackenzie Blackwood didn’t look good in this one. You can tell when the Wild scored their second goal that he didn’t have it. Even if it was blown defensive coverage that allowed Nick Foligno to get to the net all alone. He just wasn’t tracking pucks as well as you’d like. The McCarron disallowed goal was another example of that.

10. I spent all morning wondering if starting Blackwood was the right move. Given how Scott Wedgewood had looked, it felt like the full game and a half he sat in Minnesota would’ve been enough to get him the reset he needed. And it’s nothing against Blackwood or his performance in Game 4, but Wedgewood has been the more consistent goalie and was making more high-danger saves.

Bednar made a comment after morning skate about how he’ll ride a hot goalie until he needs to make a change. I just wonder if it ever makes sense for a coach to make a change before the goalie struggles. It’s probably not an easy thing to do. But I do applaud Bednar for still making the change. After all, Blackwood wasn’t the only one struggling in the first period.

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