Avalanche vs. Kings Game 1: Key takeaways as Colorado begins quest for Stanley Cup

AtlanticBruinsCanadiensLightningMaple LeafsPanthersRed WingsSabresSenatorsMetropolitanBlue JacketsCapitalsDevilsFlyersHurricanesIslandersPenguinsRangersCentralAvalancheBlackhawksBluesJetsMammothPredatorsStarsWildPacificCanucksDucksFlamesGolden KnightsKingsKrakenOilersSharksScores & ScheduleStandingsPodcastsFantasyNHL OddsNHL PicksPlayoff projectionsNHL Draft rankingRed Light NewsletterNHL Playoffs The Avs defeated the Kings 2-1 on Sunday to open their first-round series. Dustin Bradford / Icon Sportswire via Getty Images Share article6DENVER — Artturi Lehkonen’s ice-breaking goal Sunday was far from the biggest of his career. The Finn has scored not one but two overtime goals to send his teams to glory: the game-winning goal in the 2022 Stanley Cup clincher, and an Olympic overtime winner to send Finland to the medal round. But his past heroics don’t take away from the importance of what he did in Colorado’s 2-1 Game 1 win. Colorado found themselves in a tense 0-0 game late in the second. Then Lehkonen did what he does best: score a big goal. Nathan MacKinnon flung a puck toward the net from an odd angle, and Anton Forsberg allowed a rebound. Lehkonen, never afraid to go to the hard areas of the ice, swept it into the net. He punched the air with excitement. The longer the Kings had hung around, the more the heavily-favored Avalanche would have had reason to worry. Lehkonen put an end to the potential concern. Colorado scored again early in the third and survived a late Kings goal to secure the win. Nazem Kadri interrupted a stretch pass in the final minutes that would’ve potentially led to an Adrian Kempe breakaway: an impactful play to help seal the win. Jared Bednar started Scott Wedgewood in net for Game 1: an unsurprising development but a notable one nonetheless given the fairly even split between Wedgewood and Mackenzie Blackwood all year. Wedgewood rewarded his coach’s trust, making big saves on Adrian Kempe and Trevor Moore early and finishing with 24 saves in all. Wedgewood (45 games played, 43 starts) and Blackwood (39 games played, 36 starts) teamed up to win the Jennings Trophy, given to the goalie or goalie tandem that allows the fewest goals in a season. Blackwood entered the season as the presumed starter but missed the first 12 games with a lower-body injury, then suffered a lower-body injury in January. He finished the year with a .904 save percentage. Wedgewood had a .921 save percentage on the year — first in the league among goalies who played more than half their team’s games — and went 31-6-6. He had never started a playoff game before Sunday, though he’d come in in relief three times for Dallas in 2023 and once for Colorado last year. At 33, he became the eighth-oldest goalie in NHL history to make his first playoff start. No team is going to be able to fully contain the Avalanche’s firepower, but Los Angeles did a solid job limiting dangerous chances for much of the game. The Kings, though, could not capitalize on their own opportunities to swing the game in their favor. Most notably, Drew Doughty missed a golden chance in the first period. Trevor Moore burst past a slipping Josh Manson and put a puck on Wedgewood, who made the save. That led to sustained Kings pressure, culminating in a loose puck skipping to Doughty in front of a partially vacated net. He backhanded it for what looked like a sure goal, but the puck grazed Wedgewood’s left post and moved out of danger. Artemi Panarin — who needs to perform like an elite player if the Kings are going to have a chance — also failed to bury a chance in the second. He had an open net to aim at but couldn’t properly gather a puck that appeared to be bouncing. His shot missed. (Panarin, to his credit, scored the Kings’ lone goal of the game with a six-on-four shot through traffic late in the third.) Midway through the second period, Logan O’Connor wired a shot past Anton Forsberg for what would’ve been his first goal of an injury-shortened season. The celebratory horn started to blast, but the operator quickly cut it off as the referee signaled that the goal wouldn’t count. As the puck flew through the air, Jack Drury made contact with Forsberg, impeding him from making the save. Jared Bednar challenged the call. Drew Doughty bumped Drury during the play, which seemed to send him into Forsberg. After a review, though, the challenge was unsuccessful. Goaltending interference has been a frequent cause of confusion for teams this season, so much so that it became a topic of conversation at the annual general managers meetings in March. Commissioner Gary Bettman defended the review process at the meetings, saying “if you look at the body of work, I think our video replay system not only has been a leader among the sports (leagues) because all the other systems are modeled on ours.” O’Connor got his revenge for the waved-off goal. Just under six minutes into the third, he used his elite speed to pick up a loose puck in the offensive zone and cut to the net. With a step on Cody Ceci, he wristed a shot over Forsberg’s glove. Spot the pattern. Connect the terms Find the hidden link between sports terms Peter Baugh is a staff writer for The Athletic NHL based in New York. He has previously been published in the Columbia Missourian, St. Louis Post-Dispatch, Kansas City Star, Politico and the Washington Post. A St. Louis native, Peter graduated from the University of Missouri and previously covered the Missouri Tigers and the Colorado Avalanche for The Athletic. Follow Peter on Twitter @Peter_Baugh