Darcy Kuemper made 29 saves for his second consecutive shutout as the Colorado Avalanche spoiled Jack Eichel's debut with the Vegas Golden Knights with a 2-0 victory on Wednesday night in Las Vegas.
Gabriel Landeskog and Mikko Rantanen scored third-period goals and Cale Makar had two assists for Colorado. The Avalanche bounced back from a 4-1 home loss to Dallas on Tuesday night that had snapped a 19-game point streak (17-0-2) for the Western Conference leaders.
It was the third shutout of the season and 23rd of his career for Kuemper, who made 23 saves in a 4-0 victory at Dallas on Sunday. Colorado extended its season-high road winning streak to six games.
Laurent Brossoit finished with 23 saves for Vegas, which lost its second straight game and fell to just 14-11-2 at home this season.
Eichel, obtained in a Nov. 4 trade with Buffalo for a package that included Alex Tuch and Peyton Krebs, was playing in a game for the first time since March 7, 2021, after undergoing neck disc replacement surgery on Nov. 12. He spent 17:32 on the ice and had one shot to go along with four penalty minutes while also going 8-of-19 on faceoffs (42 percent).
Eichel started the game and won the opening faceoff from Nathan MacKinnon and a few minutes later picked up an interference penalty while backchecking Tyson Jost.
Vegas had the best scoring chance during the ensuing power play when Chandler Stephenson broke in on a breakaway, but Kuemper deflected his short-handed try wide.
Colorado had two good chances to score in the second period but Brossoit came up with saves both times. The first came when Devon Toews broke in alone on the left wing but Brossoit made a pad save on his wrist shot.
A few minutes later, Samuel Girard set up Landeskog in front of the net, but his one-timer hit the right post and sailed in front of the goal line where it hit Brossoit's right skate and then caromed back across the crease back past the right post.
Landeskog gave the Avalanche a 1-0 lead 41 seconds into the third period when he one-timed Makar's pass from the top of the right circle over Brossoit's left shoulder for his 23rd goal of the season.
Rantanen made it 2-0 with a power-play goal with 4:15 remaining. He roofed a pass from MacKinnon from the bottom of the right circle over a diving Brossoit for his 25th goal of the season, 11 of them coming on the power play.
--Field Level Media
Colorado | Vegas | |
Cale Makar 2 | Points | N/A |
Gabriel Landeskog 1 | Goals | N/A |
Cale Makar 2 | Assists | N/A |
Mikko Rantanen 1 | Power Play Goals | N/A |
N/A | Short Handed Goals | N/A |
Darcy Kuemper 1.000 | Save Percentage | Laurent Brossoit .920 |
Darcy Kuemper 29 | Saves | Laurent Brossoit 23 |
Team | Shots | Goals | Power Play | Penalty Kill | Penalty Mins | Face Offs Won |
Colorado | 25 | 2 | 1-3 | 2-2 | 4 | 24 |
Vegas | 29 | 0 | 0-2 | 2-3 | 6 | 37 |