Avalanche Takes On Coyotes In First-Round Series

After finishing the round robin last week, the No. 2 seed Colorado Avalanche is set to face off against the Arizona Coyotes in the first round of the 2020 postseason. The teams will take the ice for the first game of the series on Wednesday at 3:30 p.m. MT.

Colorado won two of its three round-robin outings, defeating the St. Louis Blues 2-1 on Aug. 2 and Dallas Stars 4-0 on Aug. 5, before falling 4-3 in overtime to the Vegas Golden Knights on Saturday. The Avs' five points in the qualifying round earned them the second seed in the Western Conference for the 2020 Stanley Cup Playoffs.

The Coyotes finished the regular season with a 33-29-8 mark and 74 points, ranking 22 in the NHL. Led offensively by Nick Schmaltz (45 points; 11 goals, 34 assists) and Clayton Keller (44 points; 17 goals, 27 assists), Arizona came into the Edmonton bubble ranked as the No. 11 seed in the Western Conference. The club competed against the Nashville Predators in a best-of-five Stanley Cup Qualifier series, winning three of the four games to advance to the Round 1 of the postseason as the West's seventh seed.

Arizona won 4-3 on Aug. 2 in the first game of the matchup with goals from Oliver Ekman-Larsson, Christian Dvorak and Keller in the first period and Michael Grabner in the second. Nashville scored twice in the third frame, but the Coyotes held on for the win.

Nashville evened the series on Aug. 4 by taking a 4-2 victory. Keller and Lawson Crouse scored the Coyotes' only goals in the third period. The next day, Arizona rallied for a 4-1 win over the Predators with tallies from Dvorak, Garland, Taylor Hall and former member of the Avalanche, center Carl Soderberg.

In the final game of the series on Friday, a win-or-go-home contest for the Predators, Arizona claimed a 4-3 overtime victory with a goal from Brad Richardson in the extra frame. Grabner, Phil Kessel and Jordan Oesterle each tallied in the three regulation periods before Nashville tied it up to send it to overtime, where the Coyotes eventually won 5:27 minutes in.

Arizona's series victory against Nashville can be partially attributed to the play of goaltender Darcy Kuemper, who owns the third-best save percentage in the 2020 playoffs so far at .933. Kuemper started in all four games against the Predators and earned a 2.77 goals-against average, only allowing 11 goals on 163 shots. This postseason is the first that Kuemper has participated in since he played in three consecutive seasons from 2012-2015 with the Minnesota Wild, and he has already tied his career-high three playoff wins during the qualifier series.

The Coyotes scored 14 total goals in their series with Nashville, averaging 3.50 goals-per-game. Arizona's power-play unit scored on 16.7 percent of its opportunities, while the penalty kill had a 71.4 percent success rate, ranking 12th and 21st (tied) among the 24 postseason teams, respectively.

Arizona's special teams found success during the regular season with its penalty kill ranking fifth in the league overall at 82.7 percent. The Coyotes power play scored on 19.2 percent of its chances, the 18th best in the NHL.

Colorado and Arizona split their season series during the 2019-20 campaign, with the Avs winning 3-2 in overtime at home on Oct. 12 and the Coyotes taking a 3-0 victory in Arizona on Nov. 2. In the two contests, the Avalanche's special teams went 1-for-8 on the power play and 4-for-5 on the penalty kill. The squads were slated to play their third and final matchup of the season series on March 31, but the game was cancelled after the NHL postponed the regular campaign due to coronavirus concerns

Andre Burakovsky (one goal, one assist) and Cale Makar (two assists) led the Avs against Arizona this season with two points each, while Nazem Kadri (one goal), Tyson Jost (one goal), Nathan MacKinnon (one assist), Mikko Rantanen (one assist) and Samuel Girard (one assist) each recorded a point.

On the Arizona side, Schmaltz (one goal, one assist), Kessel (one goal, one assist), Keller (two assists) and Alex Goligoski (two assists) led the Coyotes against Colorado. In addition, seven other Arizona players recorded a point during the season series.

Despite splitting their regular-season matchups, Colorado owns a 64-50-18 franchise mark against the Coyotes franchise dating back to when Arizona was the Winnipeg Jets and the Avalanche was the Quebec Nordiques. The Coyotes moved to Phoenix in 1996, just one year after the Avs moved to Denver. Since then, the teams have played 83 games against one another and Colorado has earned a 44-29-6 record with four ties against the team in the desert.

While the Avs are preparing for their third consecutive playoff run, Arizona is set to play its first playoff series since the 2011-12 campaign. The Coyotes nearly clinched a berth to the 2018-19 postseason, but finished ninth in the West, four points behind the second wild-card team in the conference, the Avalanche.

This is the 20th time that the Arizona franchise has qualified for the playoffs and the ninth time since the team relocated to Phoenix. The Coyotes' best playoff bid came during the 2011-12 season when the team advanced to the Western Conference Final before falling in five games to the eventual Stanley Cup-winning Los Angeles Kings.

The Avs and Coyotes have only met during the postseason once in 2000, and the Avalanche defeated Arizona 4-1 in five games during the conference quarterfinals. Colorado outscored the Coyotes 17-10 in the series and only fell once in Phoenix during Game 4.

Game 1 of the 2020 series is set for Wednesday at 3:30 p.m. MT, while Game 2 will take place on Friday at 12 p.m. MT. Games 3 and 4 are Saturday at 1 p.m. MT and Monday at 3:30 p.m. MT, respectively, with all contests taking place at Rogers Place in Edmonton, Alberta.