Avalanche score seven in win against Sharks

DENVER -- Mikko Rantanen scored a goal in his sixth straight game for the Colorado Avalanche in a 7-3 win against the San Jose Sharks at Ball Arena on Tuesday.

"I'm feeling healthy and I'm feeling good on the ice," Rantanen said. "Playing with [Gabriel Landeskog] and [Nathan MacKinnon] is a great pleasure and I just go out and play and work as hard as I can to do the right things. It's been nice to get rewarded. It's been good for now and I just have to keep it going."
Brandon Saad scored two goals, Valeri Nichushkin had a goal and an assist, and Cale Makar had three assists for Colorado (4-3-0). Philipp Grubauer made 27 saves.
"I thought all four lines were ready to skate, were tenacious on pucks," Avalanche coach Jared Bednar said. "I thought we were stronger on pucks in the offensive zone and moving our feet whenever we were touching it. [We were] just a little bit more in sync for me. I thought our [defensemen] did a nice job staying part of our offense. We got some timely goals and some nice performances from our guys."

Logan Couture and Ryan Donato each had a goal and an assist for San Jose (3-4-0). Martin Jones allowed five goals on 19 shots before being replaced in the second period by Devan Dubnyk, who made 21 saves.
"Both goalies were left out to dry multiple times," Sharks coach Bob Boughner said. "It's tough to make a goalie evaluation. I don't blame our goalies, and we'll look at the game tape and make a decision who starts next game (against Colorado on Thursday). They both didn't have a lot of help. In these games you almost have to look at them, you have to make the corrections, you've got to make the adjustments and you've got to throw them away and forget about them. It's just one of those nights for us."
Donato gave the Sharks a 1-0 lead at 10:29 of the first period when he batted the puck out of the air in-between Grubauer and the right post.
Joonas Donskoi tied 1-1 at 16:15 on a tip of Erik Johnson's shot from the right point, and Saad scored 46 seconds later with a shot from the slot to make it 2-1.
Rantanen increased the lead to 3-1 at 19:21, scoring on a one-timer from the right face-off dot off a pass from MacKinnon on a power play.
"With him you always have to be ready," Rantanen said of MacKinnon. "It can come from anywhere. His scoring ability everybody knows, but also his passing is phenomenal."

Nichushkin made it 4-1 at 1:32 of the second period on a shorthanded breakaway, and Samuel Girard pushed the lead to 5-1 at 5:48.
Noah Gregor cut it to 5-2 at 7:44 with a backhand after he skated through the slot. Devon Toews made it 6-2 at 13:30 when he shot into an open net.
Saad scored his second of the game off a pass from Andre Burakovsky to make it 7-2 at 15:01 of the second.
"After the second it was tough, but we play them again in two days so we have to try to stay positive, send a message, because for sure we can do better," Sharks forward Tomas Hertl said. "It was not fun."
The Sharks made it 7-3 at 12:43 of the third period when Couture redirected Donato's pass in front.
"We made too many mistakes, turned the puck over and didn't give our goalies much of a chance," Couture said. "It's really the first one of those. I thought we competed harder in the third, which we can build on. When you have a game like that you have to take some positives and move on. We're going to have to be prepared against them (Thursday). Their speed is one of their best assets."
NOTES:Sharks forward Patrick Marleau played his 1,730th game, one behind Ron Francis for fourth in NHL history. … MacKinnon had six shots to extend his streak with at least one shot on goal to 227 games, tying Joe Sakic for the longest regular-season streak in Avalanche/Quebec Nordiques history. … Forward Kiefer Sherwood had an assist in 9:58 of ice time in his Avalanche debut.