The Colorado Avalanche are the fourth NHL team to score seven or more goals four times in one postseason run and first to do that in 37 years. They’re the first team since 1996 to score at least 11 goals in the first two games of the Stanley Cup Final, a total they padded on Saturday with a 7-0 romp at Ball Arena that left them two wins away from dethroning the two-time defending Cup champion Tampa Bay Lightning.
Fifteen Colorado players earned at least one point in the first two games of the Final, led by dynamic winger Mikko Rantanen’s five assists and Valeri Nichushkin’s three goals and four points. They’ve made 2021 playoff MVP Andrei Vasilevskiy look mortal in net, though he can’t be blamed for faltering against the high-quality chances that resulted when his teammates abandoned him to face two-on-one breaks. “We left him out to dry,” Lightning captain Steven Stamkos said.
But the biggest reason the Avalanche can take a stranglehold on the Cup in Game 3 on Monday at Amalie Arena is their smothering defense, which has silenced the Lightning’s big scoring threats and provided a foundation for their own stunning scoring spree.
