{"id":655328,"date":"2026-05-20T23:09:09","date_gmt":"2026-05-20T23:09:09","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/655328\/"},"modified":"2026-05-20T23:09:09","modified_gmt":"2026-05-20T23:09:09","slug":"makar-wont-play-game-1-of-west-final-for-avalanche-vs-golden-knights-2","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/655328\/","title":{"rendered":"Makar won\u2019t play Game 1 of West Final for Avalanche vs. Golden Knights"},"content":{"rendered":"

Makar has five points (four goals, one assist), 22 shots on goal and 18 blocked shots in nine games this postseason. He is averaging 24:59 per game, second on Colorado to\u00a0defenseman Devon Toews<\/a>\u00a0(25:28).<\/p>\n

\u201cYou can\u2019t replicate it; he\u2019s the best defenseman in the world,\u201d defenseman Josh Manson<\/a>\u00a0said. \u201cYou can\u2019t sugarcoat it.\u201d<\/p>\n

Defenseman Sam Malinski<\/a> and forward Artturi Lehkonen<\/a>, each of whom missed the final two games of the second round, will play.\u00a0<\/p>\n

Malinski knows that some of the workload will fall on him in the absence of Makar. The 27-year-old says he will be ready, as will the other defensemen.<\/p>\n

“Yeah, I mean, I don’t know if pressure is the right word,\u201d Malinski said Tuesday. \u201cLike, we’re all going to have to play a little bit more and we’ll be challenged with different situations. Like, I might have to penalty kill or whatever it is. But, yeah, I wouldn’t say we feel pressure. We’re just going to have to step up.”<\/p>\n

The Avalanche have dressed eight defensemen during the playoffs, with Ahcan and Nick Blankenburg<\/a>\u00a0asked to jump in because of injuries.<\/p>\n

That depth is one of the things that has made Colorado such a threat in winning the Presidents\u2019 Trophy and eight of its first nine playoff games against the Los Angeles Kings and the Wild.\u00a0<\/p>\n

\u201cBest defenseman in the world. He\u2019s not going to be easily replaced,\u201d forward Logan O’Connor<\/a> said of Makar. \u201cThere\u2019s not one guy that\u2019s going to be able to do it. I think the advantage we have with the group we have in the game tonight is, a lot of guys can be minute-munchers for us \u2026 those guys can play heavy, hard minutes for us, and I think just by committee we know we\u2019re going to have to maybe execute a bit of a different game plan, be that much tighter defensively and just try not to get ahead of ourselves offensively and just be patient within the game.\u00a0<\/p>\n

\u201cCale presents a dynamic ability that is super unique in the League, and no one\u2019s going to replicate that tonight, but it\u2019s on the (defense) corps as a whole and our group as a whole to try and pick it up when we can.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Makar has five points (four goals, one assist), 22 shots on goal and 18 blocked shots in nine…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":654896,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[66],"tags":[385,99],"class_list":["post-655328","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-nhl","tag-nhl","tag-sports"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/655328","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=655328"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/655328\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/654896"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=655328"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=655328"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=655328"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}