MacKinnon, Avalanche recover, top Ducks late in OT for 1st win

DENVER -- Nathan MacKinnon scored with 41 seconds remaining in overtime, and the Colorado Avalanche recovered to get their first win of the season, 4-3 against the Anaheim Ducks at Ball Arena on Friday.

MacKinnon skated in from the neutral zone and beat Ducks goalie Lukas Dostal on a wrist shot from the slot. The goal came after Troy Terry tied it for Anaheim with 13 seconds left in the third period with a wrist shot from the left circle and Dostal pulled for the extra skater.

“I'm trying to score,” said MacKinnon, who also had an assist. “That's what I'm trying to do. They're out there for a bit, and I'm happy [Ducks defenseman Pavel Mintyukov] thought I was going wide. I thought he had me, honestly. When I cut middle, I thought he was just going to hit me but [it] managed to trickle in somehow. Wasn't a great shot, but we were due for an ugly one to finally go in, for sure.”

Ross Colton scored twice in the third period, Casey Mittelstadt had a goal and an assist, and Mikko Rantanen had three assists for the Avalanche (1-4-0), who avoided losing their fifth straight game to begin the season. Alexandar Georgiev made 17 saves.

“You've got to be happy with not only the effort and the determination that they played with, but to be able to sustain it as long as they did, and to just stick with it regardless of the score. It's a great effort,” Colorado coach Jared Bednar said. “It is a relief. More importantly, I think, than relief, it's looking past that. It’s the guys getting rewarded, finally, for like playing the right way.”

Leo Carlsson and Ryan Strome also scored, and Dostal made 45 saves for the Ducks (2-1-1).

“It was an incredible goaltending performance,” Anaheim coach Greg Cronin said. “Just amazing. We were just so fortunate to be in the game. They had doubled, tripled the shots at one point. They played with a playoff urgency. They had us on our heels the whole night, and he kept us in the game.

“We were bad. We didn’t play well. It’s one of those games you throw the tape away and get ready for [the Los Angeles Kings] on Sunday.”

Anaheim was outshot 49-20, including 35-11 after two periods.

"It's just 50-20 shots, tie game. It's just the way it's going, obviously,” MacKinnon said. “I think we've honestly played four of five solid games, and we've got to treat Sunday like we're down 2-0 because we got a lot of ground to make up. Obviously, it's one win. It's not like we're going crazy here. We're a (Stanley) Cup favorite.”

Carlsson gave the Ducks a 1-0 lead at 6:05 of the first period when he located a loose puck along Georgiev’s leg pad in the middle of a net-front scrum and knocked it in.

Strome extended it to 2-0 at 19:36 after he buried the rebound of Brian Dumoulin’s initial shot.

“Maybe the positives [were] just for the amount that we had to defend tonight, I thought our D-zone structure was OK for the most part,” Terry said. “They’re going to have their space and time because of how dynamic some of their players are. It fell apart for us with the breakouts. Forwards not working to get into spots for the ‘D’ or whatever it was. We just didn’t seem connected on breakouts.”

Mittelstadt cut it to 2-1 on a breakaway 57 seconds into the second period. Nikolai Kovalenko found him in the neutral zone before Mittelstadt finished on a forehand-backhand move over the leg of Dostal.

“At the end of the day, a lot of persistence in this group tonight, and that's all you can ask for,” Avalanche defenseman Cale Makar said. “Everybody was super committed, shift in, shift out. In between periods, everybody was talkative. We knew that this was a game to get that ‘W.'"

Colton tied it 2-2 with a power-play goal 35 seconds into the third period. Mittelstadt passed from the left circle to Colton for a one-timer from the slot during a 5-on-3 advantage.

Colton’s second goal gave the Avalanche a 3-2 lead at 11:42. He scored from below the left hash marks when he one-timed Rantanen’s centering pass from behind the net.

“Just trying to play my game,” Colton said. “Getting elevated to play with Mikko and Nate, they kind of make it easy for me out there. Try and play fast, check pucks back, and kind of get into the open areas. Because again, two of the best players in the League, if you get open, they're going to find you.”

NOTES: Makar extended his season-opening point streak to five games (one goal, eight assists) and became the first defenseman in Avalanche/Quebec Nordiques history to do so multiple times (2019-20). … MacKinnon scored his 14th overtime goal to extend his Avalanche/Nordiques record. … Mittelstadt’s goal was his 200th NHL point. … Kovalenko got his first NHL point with an assist on Mittelstadt’s goal. It was Kovalenko's fifth game.