Defenseman Cale Makar scored two goals on Wednesday, helping the Colorado Avalanche stave off elimination with a 5-3 victory over the Dallas Stars in Game 5 of their Western Conference semifinal series.
The Stars hold a 3-2 lead in the best-of-seven series heading into Game 6 on Friday in Denver.
Colorado’s Artturi Lehkonen and Nathan MacKinnon each had a goal and an assist and Casey Mittelstadt also scored. Alexandar Georgiev made 23 saves to help the Avalanche end a three-game skid.
Joe Pavelski got his first goal of the 2024 playoffs and Miro Heiskanen and Logan Stankoven also scored for the Stars. Jason Robertson had two assists and Jake Oettinger turned aside 22 shots for Dallas, which played without three-time 30-goal scorer Roope Hintz (upper body).
Stationed below the goal line, Mittelstadt banked the puck off Oettinger and into the net at 1:12 of the third period to give Colorado a 3-2 edge, the Avalanche’s first lead of the night and series. It was Mittelstadt’s third goal of thepostseason and second in as many games.
Makar, who scored a power-play goal late in the second period, doubled the lead at 4:28 of the third after his shot from the right circle handcuffed Oettinger.
Stankoven halved the deficit by deflecting defenseman Esa Lindell’s point shot past Georgiev at 5:44 of the third period, his third of the playoffs.
MacKinnon restored the two-goal edge at 16:50, wiring a shot past Oettinger for his fourth of the postseason.
In the first period, Robertson’s aggressive forecheck forced a turnover and sent the puck to Matt Duchene, whose one-touch pass found Pavelski on the doorstep for an easy conversion to open the scoring at 9:03.
Lehkonen tied the game 1-1 with 0.6 seconds remaining in the first period after converting a power-play one-timer from MacKinnon for his sixth goal of the postseason.
Heiskanen converted a goalmouth feed from Robertson off a two-on-none advantage to give Dallas a 2-1 lead at 11:39 of the second period. The goal was Heiskanen’s fifth of these playoffs and 15th career of his postseasoncareer to tie Hall of Famer Sergei Zubov and Craig Hartsburg for most by a defenseman in franchise history.