CHICAGO – The Wood is good in net for the Colorado Avalanche. Very good.

One night after Mackenzie Blackwood posted a 35-save shutout against the Nashville Predators, Scott Wedgewood matched his goaltending partner, stopping all 22 shots against the Chicago Blackhawks to lead the Avalanche to a 1-0 victory on Sunday. The performance marked the first time in franchise history that the Avalanche had recorded shutouts in games on back-to-back days.

Not only do the Avalanche have a fantastic situation in net on the ice, but the chemistry between the two off the ice is magical. When The Denver Gazette asked Wedgewood if there was a friendly competition between the two goaltenders, the 33-year-old netminder looked at his goalie partner and had some fun.

“Yeah, I told him ‘piss off,’” Wedgewood joked. “I give up nine one-goal games, he comes out and gets a shutout and just laughs in my face.”

Blackwood, who was putting his gear away, got a good chuckle out of that before Wedgewood got serious.

“Obviously, we’re both proud of each other. Every time we get in there, we’re our biggest fans, I think,” Wedgewood said. “We know what each other go through. He missed a lot of time there and great to have him back and the workload for us is going to be great moving forward. To see him come out and give us that performance, I think it just solidifies how much he means to this team.”

Wedgewood’s workload calmed down as the game went on, but for the second straight game, the Avalanche came out sluggish. Colorado was held to just two shots on goal in the first period by Chicago, with one of those shots coming off a center ice dump-in by Nathan MacKinnon.

They needed Wedgewood to be great, like Blackwood was the night before. And he was. In the second period, the Avalanche responded, outshooting the Blackhawks 19-1 and scoring the only goal of the game off the stick of Cale Makar.

“Needed that (second) period after the first, (which) was not very good at all,” coach Jared Bednar said. “I thought (Wedgewood) did a great job keeping us in that game in the first period and then we started to play the right way, a little bit more connected in all three zones.”

That’s now back-to-back nights where the Avalanche perhaps didn’t play their best, but found a way to win. It’s also two very different types of victories compared to some of the games we’ve seen where they’ve blown the other team out of the building.

This is an Avalanche team that seems very capable of winning in many different ways.

“It’s a good confident piece for us right now to be able to win these games,” Makar said. “I think being able to win in all these different ways is good for us.”

The team knows that, while these November wins are important, it’s all about how they look come April. They have not lost sight of that.

“We want to keep building it at this point in the season,” Makar said. “Nobody is going to look back in 50 games and think about what we did in game 20. I think we just got to keep building it and just go from there.”

If they’re still building it, the base should be pretty solid right about now.

Avalanche 1, Blackhawks 0

What happened: After a poor first period, the Avalanche locked things down, allowing 11 shots over the final 40 minutes.

What went right: With a handful of regular forwards missing, the Avalanche dressed a pretty inexperienced fourth line consisting of Zakhar Bardakov, Tristen Nielsen, and Jason Polin, but that line was responsible for the only goal of the game. “I thought they were outstanding,” Bednar said. “Didn’t play a lot, but they set the next line up behind them with (offensive zone) position. Drew a bunch of icings, drew a penalty, scored a goal with the help of Cale. They were impactful tonight, for sure.”

What went wrong: Colorado’s power play continues to baffle with how bad it has been. They went 0-for-5 on the weekend and failed to generate any real scoring chances with the man advantage.

Avalanche goal scorer: Makar (9)

Between the pipes: Scott Wedgewood stopped 22 shots for his first shutout of the season. “(Goaltending) has been incredible, being able to hold us in games,” Makar said.

What’s next: The Avalanche will host the San Jose Sharks at 7 p.m. Wednesday at Ball Arena.