Postgame Wrap-Up: Trip Concludes with Another OT Loss

BOSTON--For the third consecutive contest, the Colorado Avalanche earned a point in the standings but lost in overtime.
The Avs fell 2-1 in the extra frame to the Boston Bruins at TD Garden to wrap up a three-game road trip, a journey that featured a Colorado loss past regulation in each outing. The Avalanche began the trip with consecutive 4-3 overtime losses at the Washington Capitals and New York Islanders.

The last time Colorado played three straight overtime games was March 4-8, 2018 when the team also went 0-3 in the additional stanza.
"It was a tight game against [the Bruins], 1-1, low score--same thing with Islanders, same thing with Wash," said Colorado defenseman Nikita Zadorov. "We came back, all three good teams, really good teams. I am sure it is a big plus for us, but we lost those three points where we could have won, that's the frustrating part."
Against Boston, the Avs went 5-for-5 on the penalty kill, which included one in the closing minutes of the game when they found themselves shorthanded with 2:15 remaining in regulation.

"The kill was great, the kill saves us the game there," said head coach Jared Bednar. "We got called for one down in the corner, I couldn't see it so I don't know, but at that time in the game we have to come up with a huge penalty kill to keep it 1-1 just to go to overtime and we stepped up big.
"[Semyon Varlamov] made a couple big saves there and he had a really good night, I thought their goalie was really good [too]. It wasn't a high-event game, but it was a good hockey game, a tight-checking game. We come out here, and we get another point--it's a big point for us."
Varlamov was in net for all three games of the trip and made 33 saves against the Bruins after denying 37 shots on Saturday at the Islanders and 38 in Washington to open the trip on Thursday.
"I think [Varlamov] got better every game. Not just Varly, but we have been talking about cleaning up our checking and our commitment to defend and our awareness as a team and certainly over the last couple games have been a lot better in that area," said Bednar. "It is leading to points. We were struggling when we came out on the road. We were coming into three really tough buildings, against three really good teams, and we just got points in all three. To me, that is a huge step forward. Now we got to get over the hump and go get a win."
The Avs return home to Pepsi Center on Tuesday to host the Toronto Maple Leafs.

COLORADO VERSUS BOSTON:The overtime loss concluded the Avalanche's two-game season series with Boston and the team finished 1-0-1 in the set.
It also snapped a 10-game winning streak for the Avs at TD Garden, but Colorado's still hasn't had a regulation loss to the Bruins in Boston since March 30, 1998.
The outing was also the Avalanche's last as the visiting team in an Eastern Conference building in 2018-19. The squad finished with a 7-5-4 record on the road against the East and is 13-8-5 overall in cross-conference matchups.
BACK-TO-BACK COMPLETE: After also playing the Islanders on Saturday, the game in Boston finished Colorado's eighth back-to-back set of the season.
The Avs will play on consecutive days 11 times this season, with the next such instance coming on Feb. 22-23 when Colorado visits the Chicago Blackhawks and Nashville Predators. The team is 3-3-2 in both games of these sets.
MORE AVALANCHE NOTES:It was the second of two straight afternoon games for the Avs who are now 3-2-2 in daytime contests this season. In total, the team will play 13 afternoon contests (5 p.m. start time or earlier).
Nathan MacKinnon scored his 29th goal of the season and is now tied with Gabriel Landeskog for the team lead.
Landeskog finished with 10 shots on net, the second time this season he's registered 10 or more shots in a single game (also Jan. 9, 2019 at Calgary, 12).
J.T. Compher assisted on MacKinnon's marker and now has points in consecutive games after also notching a goal in Saturday's contest against the Islanders.