Avalanche defeat Kings for third straight win

DENVER --Andre Burakovsky and Nazem Kadri each had a goal and an assist for the Colorado Avalanche in a 4-1 win against the Los Angeles Kings at Ball Arena on Sunday.

"We're generating offense on rebounds and getting some good looks," Kadri said. "That's the identity of our team, our speed and possession. With the talent we have in this dressing room, we haven't been scoring at the rate we're used to, but that's going to happen. You don't lose that touch. Over time, I think we're going to start to wear some teams out and hopefully generate some more goals."
Nathan MacKinnon and Joonas Donskoi scored, and Philipp Grubauer made 27 saves for the Avalanche (16-8-2), who have won three in a row and are 5-1-1 in their past seven games.
Cal Petersen made 37 saves for the Kings (11-10-6), who lost 2-0 to Colorado on Friday in the opener of the two-game set.
"Outstanding, very calm," Los Angeles coach Todd McLellan said of Petersen. "[He] gave us a chance to steal one [Friday]. Today, we played a better game, but we're not at their level yet. But he was what we thought he could be and what he has been all year. He was outstanding.
"We created more, we had more in the offensive zone than we had [Friday] night. Some of these goals are preventable, but yet there could have been three or four others if Cal hadn't stood on his head."
Kadri gave the Avalanche a 1-0 lead at 11:05 of the first period when he skated into the offensive zone, sidestepped defenseman Tobias Bjornfot above the left face-off circle, and moved into the slot for a shot glove side.
"I knew that the defenseman was going to be poaching a little bit, so I just tried to stay patient, drag it around him, and threw it in the corner [of the net]," Kadri said. "Lucky that worked out."

Burakovsky scored with a backhand in front after a pass from Kadri to give Colorado a 2-0 lead at 14:05 of the second period.
"We want to get to the net as quick as possible," Burakovsky said. "I just saw 'Naz' in the corner, he was open, and I was trying to get to the net. Our line's (Burakovsky, Kadri and Brandon Saad) been finding our mojo a little bit and has been really good lately. We just have to keep that up."
Donskoi extended the lead to 3-0 at 17:09 on a loose puck in front after Dan Renouf batted it out of midair.

Grubauer made the save on two breakaways by Andreas Athanasiou in the second period, the first one with his glove at 1:33 and the second with his blocker at 7:00.
"Got some huge saves from 'Grubie' in the second period," Colorado coach Jared Bednar said. "One of them was a bad bounce and one was where he squeezed through our team in the neutral zone where we got caught flat-footed."
Kurtis MacDermid scored through a screen with a shot from the blue line to make it 3-1 at 6:07 of the third period.
MacKinnon scored an empty-net goal with 3:19 left for the 4-1 final.
"They're a high-volume shooting team; they're always throwing pucks at the net, they find ways to get it through, recovering pucks off the initial shots," Kings defenseman Mikey Anderson said. "I thought we came out a lot better [than Friday]. I felt we were more engaged physically and mentally throughout the whole game.
"Offensively, we found some ways to make some more plays, get a few more pucks to the net, create some chances. Overall it was better, but we're not satisfied."
NOTES:The Kings are scheduled to play the St. Louis Blues in Los Angeles on Monday but are staying overnight in Denver because of blizzard conditions. … Kings forward Dustin Brown missed his first game because of an upper-body injury that McLellan said has been bothering him. There was no further update. … Los Angeles center Anze Kopitar played his 1,100th NHL game and had an assist. He has scored 11 points (three goals, eight assists) in the past eight games. … Avalanche forward Mikko Rantanen had one assist and has scored 10 points (five goals, five assists) in the past seven games.