It took half a season for the NHL’s top seed to get hit with a considerable amount of adversity. And it all seemed to strike within a few days.
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The Avalanche are in Tampa Bay on Tuesday to take on the surging Lightning, who have won seven games in a row. Colorado will be without team captain Gabriel Landeskog, top-pair defenseman Devon Toews, starting goalie Mackenzie Blackwood, or depth forward Joel Kiviranta. All four of them sustained injuries over the past week.
The first two are the biggest of the bunch. Landeskog, who has played in every game to date, will miss his first game since returning from a 3+ year absence. His upper-body injury was the result of a terrible crash into the Florida Panthers goalpost in the second period after losing his balance. Landeskog was battling for the loose puck with defenseman Gustav Forsling when he toepicked and went hard into the net.
Toews is the other injury that hit the Avs over the weekend. He missed Florida’s game, which led to Ilya Solovyov drawing in for the first time since Nov. 1.
Head coach Jared Bednar said Landeskog and Toews are both out week-to-week. It’s still not yet known if they’ll have to miss the Olympics.
READ MORE: Avalanche’s Landeskog, Toews Both Out Week-to-Week
Blackwood has missed the entire road trip. He last played on New Year’s Eve. Without him available, Scott Wedgewood is likely to make his third consecutive start in four days. Wedgewood suffered his first regulation loss since October in Sunday’s 2-1 loss to the Panthers.
The Avs will probably have to jumble their lines to account for Landeskog’s absense. We could see Artturi Lehkonen back on the Nathan MacKinnon line, which opens a spot for either Ross Colton or Gavin Brindley alongside Brock Nelson and Valeri Nichushkin. Taylor Makar will definitely draw back in, likely on the fourth line with Zakhar Bardakov and Parker Kelly.
The Lightning are the No. 1 seed in the Eastern Conference and, like the Avs, look like they have the most complete lineup they’ve had since 2022. They’re missing Victor Hedman and Ryan McDonagh, but both J.J. Moser and Darren Raddysh have stepped up in a big way to lead the blueline.
Andrei Vasilevskiy is expected to get the nod in goal.
