Avalanche Drop Multiple Huge Last Minute Updates...

The Colorado Avalanche have been absolutely red hot with Nathan MacKinnon leading the way. Sam Colalino is yet again not listed on the lineup for tonight. I will see if there is any more updates on that. TJ Hughes has been playing absolutely great on the third line. And we'll see if he can score any more points in his young NHL career. Welcome to Avalanche Digest. As always, don't forget to subscribe and let's go beat the Leafs tonight. It's our first Eastern Conference matchup. Really looking forward to it. Now, let's get right into the video. So, Avs are going to be hosting Toronto tonight at, in just a couple of hours actually, this is very shortly after I'm making this video. Avs are 3-1 on the season, Maple Leafs at 5 o'clock Mountain Time here. Avs are currently in second place in the conference just behind Winnipeg. Winnipeg just lost in regulation, so this is a chance for the Avs with a game in hand to take advantage. Kind of interesting there that Winnipeg is behind in goals differential by that much. we are 14 goals ahead of them so any tie with them would catapult us in the lead here's how Toronto is doing so far this season Toronto right now they are a little bit down they are two two and one with a negative one goal differential they just lost in overtime and only five points but this is their sixth game while the Avs are only playing their fifth so early on to start the season the Avs have been perfect on the penalty kill and i think that's something that's going to help them in this game i think that's something they're going to have to use to their advantage 30.8% on the power play unfortunately all that percentage is just from the very first game of the season i don't believe we have any other power play goals if i'm not mistaken we also do not have any short-handed goals as we almost had one in the first game of the season but that one was negated by about one second right after he got released from the box so Toronto looked pretty good on the power play this year but here are their early rates going into the season if they'll pop up here so Toronto on the power play right now it's 20% they're right middle of the pack kind of got to watch out for Matthews and Marchenko really got to hope that they don't do anything to negate that perfect 100 percent penalty kill we have we just need to keep that up people like Devon Toews, Kel McCarron have been great on the penalty kill other guys like Parker Kelly even Zachary Lavoie in the short time he's been with us has played some great hockey this is what the Avs looked like last season on the power play it was not very good so hopefully the Avs can get that number way up this year we were first on the penalty kill last year and hopefully we follow suit in that this year as well toronto last season they were pretty solid on the power play not bad not amazing but right in the middle of the pack 21.3 percent their penalty kill was rather good fifth in the NHL so i think that actually may say sixth but pretty high up on the boards for penalty kill there so toronto will be bringing special teams tests for the Avs i'm excited to see how they match up on the man advantage and the man disadvantage so here is what the possible lineup looks like for the Leafs right now Marchenko Matthews and Roslevic McKenna Nick Paul and William Nylander, Easton Cohen, Teddy Bluger and Colton Sissons and Bo Grue I don't not even pronounce that one uh Joshua and Duhamel, Duhamel was on the Avs a couple years back we know him very well so Riley radish on the top pair mccabe tana on the second ekman larson and Stetcher and we are most likely going to see Bobrovsky in net today, Keo McCarr had a fantastic game last week, he may be a difference maker in this one, just again, well not last week in the last game but he may be a difference maker once again, one thing that's going to affect Toronto pretty much is John Tavares is not taking part and is away from the team for personal reasons pretty similar to the Avs with Logan O'Connor as of right now he's still away with the team away from the team with personal family issues that he's dealing with if you want to know what happened they have said it on Twitter I believe his father passed away but we're not going to talk too much about that because that's something he's dealing with but really hoping the best for Logan O'Connor especially as he's dealing with an injury recovery as well on top of that it cannot be easy for him right now here is the goalie rest that the Avs have right now Blackwood has gotten a couple days rest so he's probably the one that is going to be in net he's going to be pretty fresh Wedgwood did have a day off in between but I don't think we're going to see him again as Blackwood is the one making the big bucks so we'll probably see him between the pipes so here is what the Avs lineup is looking like for tonight tonight we got MacKinnon and Mac and Naitas on the top line Landeskog and Nelson and Kadri on the second line Schwartz, Svechnikov, and Hughes on that third line Parker, Kelly, McQuaid, and Larue on the bottom line. Tanev, Makar on the top pair. Kulak and Manson in the middle. Julson and Brent Burns as the bottom pair. Defensive pairs have kind of been mix and match as we've been going. They've been playing pretty well all together, though. Blackwood will get the start net most likely. The bottom two lines for the Avs, the third line and the fourth line, McQuaid and Svechkov kind of switch back and forth between there. And I think Jadon Schwartz honestly has a good shot of being moved up to the second line. Landeskog hasn't had the hottest start. And Schwartz, on the other hand, has had the hottest start. He's been playing absolutely very well. I don't know if we necessarily want to move him from the line that he has the chemistry going with right now. But there's a chance that he could make a very powerful second line left wing. And I very much like his play so far. And I'm excited to see what he does for future games. I think he could definitely be a big help to this team for future games and for the rest of the season. So here is what the goalie rest looks like for Toronto. So Vovrovsky was the one who got the last start, but it was on October 8th, so we are a couple days removed from that. He only has one day of rest, so maybe we see Stolarz. There is a chance. Both of them are performing about at the same level, but Vovrovsky is their main guy. We could possibly see him, but not exactly, like, not exactly a guarantee. but here are the as high danger medium and low danger chances from last season so this is 25 26 share of shots faced 24.8 and the league average is 25.9 save percentage is 829 and the league average is 808 so plus 20 plus 2 on the rest of the league medium danger also plus 0.03 and low danger plus 0.006 so the abs are pretty good at holding up few chances allowed to save are above the league one thing the abs need to do is the scoring needs defensive support this is a quote from Mackenzie Blackwood obviously a little unsustainable to score that many goals every game but we'll take it while when they come definitely not going to turn away that level of scoring but definitely need a little more solid defense in front of the net we also need solid defense in the net we both both of our goalies have yet to score above a .900 save percentage yet this season well not in a game but overall they do not have over a .900 save percentage Blackwood is at like 895 while Wedgewood is at 897 Nathan MacKinnon has been absolutely red hot for the Colorado Avalanche he is yet again one of the top goal scorers point scorers in the entire league let's look at his points for this season so far he's got three goals five assists eight points only plus one on the plus minus because of those power play goals given up early on or the shorthanded goals given up on the power play early on in the season faceoff percentage is about average for him he sits around 50% 15 shots on goals so far this season honestly thought he would have a few more at this point only one power play point that was on the five on three that was on the one-timer shot he took and scored on one game winning goal seven even strength points and five penalty minutes if you saw the fight from game one that's where that's from he's been playing pretty good MacKinnon whenever he plays the Toronto Maple Leafs he averages about two points in every meeting and about half a goal so he looks like he scores once every third game well once every two games shots on goal about three and a half per game and a one and a half assist i think he does pretty well against Toronto hopefully we can see that happen yet again McKinnon is going to be a big driving factor for this game he always is going to be a driving factor for every game but some teams know how to take him out of the equation and that's when guys like Makar need to step up and provide some offensive support speaking of Makar here's how his season is panning out so far three goals three assists after a great three-point night against the Calgary Flames he absolutely dominates the Calgary Flames every time we play them six points by the defenseman so far not on ice as much as he was last year only 21.27 for 21 minutes 27 seconds of ice time per game six blocks one takeaway 10 shots on goal one power play point five even strength points so he's at a point and a half per game for a defenseman that's a pretty impressive pace hopefully he can keep that up but that's about all i have for you today game is coming up very shortly thank you very much for watching let's go beat the Leafs first Eastern Conference matchup let's start four and one and get a strong start to the season and keep it going thank you very much i'll see you next