After two of five games in seven days, it’s safe to assume the Colorado Avalanche was looking forward to the weekend.

The visiting Chicago Blackhawks will make their only regular season appearance in Denver this afternoon, and the Avs will play their third straight Central Division opponent four days later.

The Avalanche currently have a .500 record in February, going 2-2 in that span. This would sound even more alarming if only four games were held this month due to the long Olympic suspension. A win today would thwart two consecutive months of sub-.500 records in hockey and would certainly be a boost after last Thursday’s 5-2 loss to the visiting Minnesota Wild. Mackenzie Blackwood stopped 31 of 34 shots in a game that featured an impressive goalie duel between himself and Filip Gustafsson, but Filip Gustafsson, who stopped 45 of 47 shots himself, was overshadowed by questionable calls (see Brent Burns firing puck into the crowd during an Avalanche penalty kill that had already had no downs). two skaters) and referees (is poke checking now a penalty?).

Manager Jared Bednar lamented his team’s inability to widen the gap between Minnesota and the underdog Dallas Stars. “What’s important is the ranking at the end of the year, right? So that’s it.” [game] A missed opportunity. That’s what it was. If we win, we will have 9 points and we have two games left, so we have a long way to go to catch up, but we are in a difficult situation right now. Five [points] with two people [games] There’s plenty of hockey on hand to play. We have to get our work done. ”

With this loss, Minnesota entered the first of its own back-to-back pairings and leapfrogged Dallas into second place in the Central Division, narrowing the gap with Abyss to within five points. However, like the Abs, Minnesota failed to capitalize on its chances in the second half of the back-to-back, losing 5-2 to the Utah Mammoths on Friday night at the Delta Center. The loss prevented them from closing the gap on the Avalanche to within three points, but the Avalanche can regain the seven-point lead with a win this afternoon.

Hockey gives, hockey takes away.

Nathan MacKinnon returned to action against Minnesota for the first time since returning from the Olympics, and although he didn’t add to the NHL scoring total (he was just a league-best 40 goals), he did reach the 95-point mark (Edmonton’s Connor McDavid led all skaters with 100 points). Martin Nechas, who scored his 24th and 25th goals of the season Thursday night, is now third on the team in scoring behind Brock Nelson (30 goals) and three goals shy of matching his career high with 28 goals. The loss to Minnesota may seem lopsided in the box score alone, but Blackwood’s play in keeping his team close for much of the game should be worth coming back to today.

The Abs remain the undisputed leader in the Central Division, Western Conference and overall league standings. Heading into this afternoon’s game, they have one game remaining against Dallas (Dallas plays the Nashville Predators tonight at American Airlines Center) and three games against Minnesota remaining.

Today’s game is the second of three in a row against Chicago. In the previous match on November 23rd, the Avs won with a 1-0 decision.

forward:
Gabe Landeskog – Nathan McKinnon – Martin Nechas
Artturi Lehkonen – Brock Nelson – Valeri Nichushkin
Ross Colton – Jack Drury – Victor Olofsson
Joel Kiviranta* – Parker Kelly – Gavin Brindley

defense:
Devon Toews – Cale Makar
Josh Manson – Brent Burns
Brett Clack – Sam Malinsky

Between the pipes:
mackenzie blackwood
Scott Wedgwood

Kiviranta, who was injured during the second period after being hit by Minnesota’s Zach Bogosian, is uncertain as of this writing whether he will play in today’s game.

Chicago is off to a great start heading into 2026, winning five of their first six games in January. But they followed up on that effort by losing nine of their next 12 games before the Olympics were suspended. They are currently in seventh place in the Central Division with 53 points, maintaining a two-point difference from last place St. Louis (51). They began a five-game road trip ahead of the Olympics, most recently losing 4-2 to the Nashville Predators on Thursday night at Bridgestone Arena.

Like Colorado, Chicago represented Italy at the Olympics, but on a much smaller scale. Center Teuvo Teravainen won the bronze medal with Kiviranta as a member of the Finnish national team. A notable absence was center Connor Bedard, who was not invited as a member of Canada’s Olympic roster. Bedard, who scored his 24th goal of the season Thursday night against Nashville, currently leads all Chicago skaters in assists (30) and points (54) and ranks second in goals (26) behind left wing Tyler Bertuzzi.

Bedard’s solid sophomore effort led many to believe he was on Canada’s Hockey team’s shortlist for the Olympic team, but he was ultimately removed from the roster once the final selections were announced. Bedard suffered an upper-body injury in a literally last-second confrontation with St. Louis Blues captain Brayden Schenn in December, causing him to miss 12 games, and many speculate that the injury was a major factor in Bedard’s removal from Canada’s Olympic roster.

Goaltender Spencer Knight is three wins away from tying his career-high with 19 wins in his first full season in Chicago. He will likely start today against Colorado. Despite leading all Chicago goaltenders in wins (Arvid Soderblom has five, Drew Commesso has one), Chicago has allowed two or more goals in 14 of the 19 games played since the beginning of the year. That contributed to the third place worst NHL goal difference (-33). Only St. Louis (-52) and Vancouver (-62) rank lower.

Today’s matchup with Colorado will be the only regular season visit to Denver and the first of back-to-back weekends. They will finish the weekend Sunday afternoon against the Mammoths in Salt Lake City – where else? The season series against Colorado will conclude on March 20th on home ice at the United Center.

forward:
Ryan Green – Connor Bedard – Andre Burakovsky
Oliver Moore – Frank Nazar – Tyler Bertuzzi
Ryan Donato – Jason Dickinson – Ilya Mikheyev
Teuvo Teravainen – Nick Foligno – Landon Slaggert

defense:
Alex Vlasic – Louis Crevier
Connor Murphy – Sam Lindsell
Matt Grzelcyk – Artyom Levshunov

Between the pipes:
spencer knight
Arvid Söderblom