RALEIGH, N.C. (AP) – Samuel Girard scored a tie-breaking goal with 2:37 left in the third period and Tyson Jost scored twice as the Colorado Avalanche extended their winning streak to five games with a 3-2 win over the Carolina Hurricanes on Friday night. Girard took a cross-ice pass from Gabriel Landeskog and lifted a shot high into the net to break a 2-2 tie. The Avalanche won after allowing Carolina How to Boost Your Immune System rally from a 2-0 deficit.
Pavel Francouz stopped 45 shots and won his fifth consecutive start. Jost broke a 36-game scoring drought with his sixth and seventh goals of the season as Colorado won its seventh consecutive road game, matching the longest road winning streak in franchise history. “I look at games like that and I´ve got mixed feelings, because it´s not perfect and it´s certainly not pretty,” said Avalanche coach Jared Bednar, who celebrated his 48th birthday with a win. “But we´re finding a way to get results against desperate opponents, and there´s something to be said about that, sticking with it and being able to come up big at certain points in the game.” Carolina got two goals from Teuvo Teravainen in the third period to tie the score, but fell for the second straight game to a top team from the Western Conference.
The Hurricanes, who are in a tight competition for a playoff spot in the Eastern Conference, lost 4-1 at home to the Dallas Stars on Tuesday. Carolina Hurricanes goaltender Anton Forsberg (31), of Sweden, eyes the puck as Colorado Avalanche’s Nathan MacKinnon (29) skates with it during the first period of an NHL hockey game in Raleigh, N.C., Friday, Feb. 28, 2020. (AP Photo/Karl B DeBlaker) Goalie Anton Forsberg, who was recalled from Charlotte of the American Hockey League after Petr Mrazek and James Reimer were injured Saturday in Toronto, made 29 saves for the Hurricanes on a night when coach Rod Brind´Amour was pleased with the effort, if not the final score after Girard got loose on the back side of the defense for the game winner.
“I thought it was great,” Brind´Amour said. “Other than the result and the last gaffe that we had at the end, I thought it was a great game. We were playing a great team.” Jost, a fourth-line winger who was the No. 10 pick overall in the 2016 NHL draft by the Avalanche, capitalized on an opportunity in the first period that arose when Carolina defenseman Jake Gardiner stumbled and lost the puck at the Hurricanes´ blue line. After taking possession of the loose puck, Jost skated in on a 2-on-1 break and fired a shot high into the net behind Forsberg.
Jost scored again in the second period when the Hurricanes struggled to clear the puck out of their own zone. Defenseman Cale Makar corralled the puck inside the blue line and passed to Jost in front of the net, where he redirected the puck between Forsberg´s legs and into the goal. Makar, who entered the game ranked second among NHL first-year players in points, holds franchise rookie defenseman records with 46 points, 12 goals and 34 assists. “I liked our start,” Bednar said.