{"id":566845,"date":"2026-05-04T19:12:18","date_gmt":"2026-05-04T19:12:18","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/566845\/"},"modified":"2026-05-04T19:12:18","modified_gmt":"2026-05-04T19:12:18","slug":"devon-toews-is-avalanches-steady-star-in-a-chaotic-game-1","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/566845\/","title":{"rendered":"Devon Toews is Avalanche’s steady star in a chaotic Game 1"},"content":{"rendered":"

Round 1 of the Cale Makar-Quinn Hughes heavyweight fight was absolute cinema, but the Colorado Avalanche won a key undercard bout during a frenetic Game 1 victory<\/a>.<\/p>\n

Devon Toews and Brock Faber are also two of the best defensemen in the sport, and probably the two best guys who slot in at No. 2 on their team\u2019s depth charts. Faber was fabulous in the first round against the Dallas Stars.<\/p>\n

It was Toews\u2019 night in a 9-6 win Sunday night at Ball Arena. He had a goal, three assists and helped steady the Avs while both Makar and Sam Malinski missed significant chunks of a period because of injuries.<\/p>\n

\u201cHe was great. On both sides of it, too,\u201d Avs coach Jared Bednar said. \u201cI\u2019ll look through it, but I\u2019m sure there\u2019s not a lot usually that (Toews) doesn\u2019t sort out. He\u2019s an elite thinker and skater and defender and can contribute offensively. I\u2019ll bet that out of all the scoring chances we gave up, I\u2019m not going to be like \u2018what was (Toews) doing there on that one?\u2019 That rarely happens, and I\u2019m sure tonight will be the same way, even though we gave up six.\u201d<\/p>\n

It was the first four-point game of Toews\u2019 NHL career, either in the regular season or playoffs. He led the Avalanche in ice time with 27 minutes, 35 seconds. Toews now has seven points in five Colorado playoff games, which is tied with Nathan MacKinnon for the team lead.<\/p>\n

Colorado scored five of its seven 5-on-5 goals when Toews was on the ice. The most important one might have been his goal.<\/p>\n

Minnesota rallied from a 3-0 deficit and scored three straight goals to take a 5-4 lead late in the second period. The go-ahead goal was scored shorthanded against Colorado\u2019s top power-play unit.<\/p>\n

The Avs were reeling. The building was stunned, almost silent, save for a small group of green-clad fans.<\/p>\n

Then Toews and the rest of PP2 went on the ice and responded. It wasn\u2019t a power-play goal officially, because Faber had just stepped onto the ice when Toews sent a low shot towards the net from the top of the zone that glanced off Michael McCarron\u2019s stick and fluttered past goalie Jesper Wallstedt with 1:56 remaining in the period.<\/p>\n

Multiple Avs players said the mood in the locker room during the second intermission was relatively calm. The Toews goal played a big part in that.<\/p>\n

\u201cHe was solid. He made plays defensively more than anything,\u201d Avs captain Gabe Landeskog said. \u201cWe know he doesn\u2019t always show up on the stat sheet, but defensively, he\u2019s a nightmare to play against. It\u2019s good to see him get rewarded. Knowing him, though, that\u2019s not necessarily what he bases his performance off of.\u201d<\/p>\n

Toews had to assume PP1 duties in the opening period when Makar left after his second shift of the game<\/a>. He helped set up Malinski\u2019s goal that opened the scoring, and was part of a successful power play that made it a 3-0 game.<\/p>\n

He and Malinski have played together quite a bit since the trade deadline, so that transition without Makar was pretty smooth. When Malinski missed about one-third of the second period, the Avs\u2019 defense corps adjusted again.<\/p>\n

\u201cJust trying to get by without them,\u201d Toews said. \u201cMissing Cale for a chunk of that game and then missing Sam, getting stitched up, is tough and it kind of gets you out of the flow a little bit. But we did a great job handling it back there. Ebbs and flows in that game went up and down there, but I thought we did a good job back on the back end there, kind of managing it with our numbers kind of all over the place.\u201d<\/p>\n

Faber a non-factor<\/p>\n

Faber did not have a similar night. He went to the penalty box twice, and the Avs turned both of them into goals.<\/p>\n

He was also on the ice for three more Colorado goals at even strength. The underlying numbers look solid, but this was a crazy game. Hughes had a three-point night, but he was the only Minnesota defenseman to register a point.<\/p>\n

\"MinnesotaMinnesota Wild right wing Ryan Hartman, front, drives with the puck as Colorado Avalanche defenseman Devon Toews puruses in the third period of Game 1 of an NHL hockey Stanley Cup second-round playoff series Sunday, May 3, 2026, in Denver. (AP Photo\/David Zalubowski)<\/p>\n

Makar had a three-point night, but Toews, Malinski and Nick Blankenburg all scored goals and combined for seven points. The Avs certainly missed Josh Manson, but it looked like the Wild missed Jonas Brodin (and No. 1 center Joel Eriksson Ek) even more.<\/p>\n

It also looks like Manson could return before Brodin, who isn\u2019t in Denver with the team, while the former has been on the ice the past three days. The Wild will need more from a lot of guys not named Hughes in Game 2.<\/p>\n

\u201cWhat (the Avs) live off of is their speed, and their creativity, and their playmaking ability,\u201d Faber said. \u201cWe gave them too much of that. When we beat this team, we stay on top of their guys and don\u2019t give them space, and tonight we didn\u2019t do that. I thought we took it to him at times, and we just couldn\u2019t slow them down. We can slow them down, though.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe know what we need to do. We\u2019ve got to clean it up. They definitely had the upper hand tonight, but I think come Game 2 we\u2019ll be ready to go.\u201d<\/p>\n

Want more Avalanche news? Sign up for the Avalanche Insider to get all our NHL analysis.<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Round 1 of the Cale Makar-Quinn Hughes heavyweight fight was absolute cinema, but the Colorado Avalanche won a…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":566846,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[5116],"tags":[193,1466,1116,192,144,5277,1543,1035,5,1117,1544,1180,1262,517,4,43,14],"class_list":["post-566845","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-colorado-avalanche","tag-avalanche","tag-ball-arena","tag-cale-makar","tag-colorado","tag-colorado-avalanche","tag-coloradoavalanche","tag-devon-toews","tag-gabe-landeskog","tag-hockey","tag-jared-bednar","tag-josh-manson","tag-latest-headlines","tag-more-avalanche-news","tag-nathan-mackinnon","tag-nhl","tag-sports","tag-stanley-cup"],"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/channels.im\/@nhl\/116517899729739055","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/566845","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=566845"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/566845\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/566846"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=566845"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=566845"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=566845"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}