Alexandar Georgiev made 32 saves, and Jonathan Drouin had two assists for the Avalanche (16-7-2), who had lost three straight (0-1-2).
Sam Carrick and Leo Carlsson scored, and John Gibson made 28 saves for the Ducks (10-15-0), who have lost nine of 10.
Kurtis MacDermid scored to make it 1-0 Colorado when he kicked a centering pass from MacKinnon off his own skate to his stick and beat Gibson’s glove with a wrist shot at 1:40 of the first period. The assist extended MacKinnon’s point streak to nine games.
MacKinnon one-timed a crossing pass from Drouin into the open net to make it 2-0 at 17:43 of the second period. Drouin sent a loose rebound from Josh Manson’s point shot across the top of the crease set it up.
Logan O’Connor scored to make it 3-0 when he located his own rebound in the blue paint behind Gibson and and tucked it over the line at 6:21 of the third period. MacKinnon’s second assist was his 500th in the NHL. He’s the first skater from the 2013 NHL Draft and the fourth in Avalanche/Quebec Nordiques history to reach the milestone.
Carrick scored a short-handed goal at 10:43 to cut the lead to 3-1 after he sent the puck off Georgiev’s glove and into the net on a breakaway following Mikko Rantanen’s turnover in the neutral zone.
Carlsson scored a power-play goal to make it 3-2 when he settled a pass from Troy Terry at the right circle and fired it past a diving Georgiev at 14:11 of the period.
Colorado forward Valeri Nichushkin, who missed morning skate with an illness but was expected to play, was a late scratch.
Ducks forward Max Jones and Avalanche defenseman Bowen Byram each left in the second period with an upper-body injury. Jones had leveled Byram with a big hit before O’Connor came after him.
