Nick Foligno scored twice and had an assist, Artemi Panarin had a tiebreaking goal early in the third period and the host Columbus Blue Jackets beat the Colorado Avalanche 5-2 on Tuesday night.
Pierre-Luc Dubois and Josh Anderson also scored, and Sergei Bobrovsky stopped 25 shots for the Blue Jackets.
Nathan MacKinnon and Carl Soderberg scored for Colorado, and Philipp Grubauer had 30 saves in his Avalanche debut. Colorado lost for the first time in three games this season.
The game was tied 2-2 after two periods, but Panarin scored at 5:14 of the third period. Foligno made it a 4-2 game at 11:32. Anderson scored an empty-netter at 18 minutes to ice it.
The Blue Jackets jumped on Colorado early when Foligno scored at 6:49 of the first period. Foligno dumped the puck behind the Avalanche net, and Alexander Wennberg, who had two assists, sent him a pass in front, and he buried it.
The Avalanche got into a big hole when Sheldon Dries (tripping) and J.T. Compher (hooking) took penalties 48 seconds apart midway through the first period. Columbus held the puck in the Colorado zone, and Dubois scored 37 seconds into the 5-on-3 to go ahead 2-0.
MacKinnon cut the lead in half just 3:27 into the second period. He took a pass from Mikko Rantanen in the neutral zone and used his own player and a Columbus defenseman to beat Bobrovsky for his third goal for the season.
Colorado got the equalizer on its third power play of the game. Soderberg, standing in front of the net and battling Columbus defenseman David Savard, tipped Samuel Girard's shot at 9:30 of the second period. It was Soderberg's second goal of the season.
Matt Calvert, who played 416 games over eight seasons with the Blue Jackets, was given a warm welcome back by the Columbus fans. Calvert, who signed a three-year deal with Colorado in the summer, had 72 goals and 149 points in his Blue Jackets career.
--Field Level Media
Colorado | Columbus | |
Nathan MacKinnon 1 | Points | Nick Foligno 3 |
Nathan MacKinnon 1 | Goals | Nick Foligno 2 |
Samuel Girard 1 | Assists | Alexander Wennberg 2 |
Carl Soderberg 1 | Power Play Goals | Pierre-Luc Dubois 1 |
N/A | Short Handed Goals | N/A |
Philipp Grubauer .882 | Save Percentage | Sergei Bobrovsky .926 |
Philipp Grubauer 30 | Saves | Sergei Bobrovsky 25 |
Team | Shots | Goals | Power Play | Penalty Kill | Penalty Mins | Face Offs Won |
Colorado | 27 | 2 | 1-4 | 5-6 | 12 | 31 |
Columbus | 35 | 5 | 1-6 | 3-4 | 8 | 35 |