Game 4 Running Diary: Avs Look to Take Strangle Hold

Follow along as Pat breaks down Game 4 in real time.

PREGAME

• Nothing really going on of great importance regarding the roster before Game 4, I see. I haven’t checked Twitter or anything AD wrote today, so I assume all is well and there is nothing going on that would flame up the emotions of the fanbase…

• …So Val Nichushkin is still away from the team for personal reasons and no one (outside the team) knows what is going on. This is an extremely complicated situation with a ton of underlying layers that we don’t know about it. AD’s piece today made the point that there is a general interest in this story and fans and media members are entitled to ask questions. Here is my opinion: You’re entitled to ask, but you’re not entitled to the answer. You’re not entitled to anything other than knowing he’s not there. I’m totally fine with questions, discussion and speculation. I agree with what Dater wrote today and found the piece to have fascinating insight from someone who was with the team daily for the last three decades. But Val is a human being and he is entitled to his life and privacy if he has asked for it. Just like AD and other writers are entitled to ask question about it, while others are entitled to voice their opinion that because this is clearly a private matter that it shouldn’t be talked about at all. At the end of the day, all those are are just opinions. And we’re all entitled to have them.

• My personal sentiment on this situation is the same way I view the Landeskog situation: he’s not playing, so I want to focus on the guys in uniform tonight who can help this team win because I can’t spend my time worrying about someone who can’t. I also want to make it clear as someone who worked in sports and saw players and coaches take time away from the game to deal with personal stuff, I think Val should do whatever he needs to do in whatever timetable he needs to get it done. Some things are just more important.

• Now onto Game 4.

• Faceoffs have been key. An Achilles’ heel of this team for the past several seasons, the first three games of this series has been a revelation. Maybe the Avs have gotten better on the draw! More likely that Seattle is terrible at the dot. Either way, Colorado has has several goals come as a direct result of an offensive zone draw win.

• We keep talking about Colorado needing a fast start… and the Kraken have come out and scored the first goal in all three games. Let’s see if the Avs can match the intensity of the crowd early on and get on the board first for a change.

• Seattle was rocking for its first home playoff game since the end of World War I, but Mikko made the point in the postgame with Altitude TV that Ball Arena gets rockin’ pretty good, too. Thinking back to some of those games in last year’s run and when “All The Small Things” played makes me think he’s probably on to something. (The Mack hat trick goal against St. Louis was the loudest I’ve ever heard that building get… just don’t worry about how it ended.)

• Speaking of Mikko, it’s taken me eight bullet points to get to the guy with the three-point night in Game 3. After a tough start to the series and getting called out by media members and in-game broadcasters for sub-par play, the Moose got loose in the third period with a pair of goals for his best effort of the young postseason.

• And if Mikko was REALLY good, then Nathan MacKinnon was GREAT! Both of his goals were incredible displays of raw talent. The breakaway caused by unmatched speed for his first tally and then the spin-o-rama, stutter-step for his second of the night. Combine that with the fact that he ran around the ice in the final minutes, seeking out players to be the aggressor and assert his will on was wild to see in a game that his team had all-but-locked up in the third period. We finally got to see ‘Playoff MacKinnon’ and all I could think of was the scene in Billy Madison…

  

• Lars Eller is playing in his 100th career playoff game. It was a slow start for Eller after joining Colorado at the deadline, but his game fits in perfectly with this team.

• No Jack Johnson or Darren Helm in morning skate in addition to Val. Don’t know what that means for Helm more than anything, but we should have a better understanding during/after warmups. I would assume JJ is probably still out after missing the first three. But you know what they say about assuming.

• Game 3 was BY FAR the Avs best effort of the series. I’d love to see them continue that style of game tonight and not fall back into the bad habits we saw in Denver.

• What are your thoughts on tonight’s game? Leave anything in the comment section and I’ll get to it.

Thanks for following along!
- Pat

Go Avs Go!