TAMPA, Fla. (AP) - Pavel Francouz overcome soe pregame jitters to get his second win in two career starts.
Francouz made 44 saves, Tyson Jost had three goals, and the Colorado Avalanche beat the high-powered Tampa Bay Lightning 6-2 Saturday night to remain the only NHL team without a regulation loss this season.
“It was a great challenge,” Francouz said. “Of course I was a little bit nervous about the game. But I was trying to see it as fun. It was a fun night.”
The 29-year-old Francouz followed up his first career start and win Oct. 12 against Arizona with a number of nifty saves, including a post-to-post pad stop in the first on Ondrej Palat.
“Frankie was great,” Colorado left wing Gabriel Landeskog said. “He made some really amazing saves.”
Colorado’s 7-0-1 start is the second-longest season opening point streak in franchise history, behind only the 9-0-2 start in 2000-01.
Jost opened the scoring 3:09 into the game and completed his first career hat trick with a pair of goals coming 2:49 apart early in the second period.
“We had some big nights from some guys,” Avalanche coach Jared Bednar said. “The Jost line, for me, was outstanding especially the first half of the game. Those guys were a big difference maker tonight.”
Colorado, 3-0-1 on a six-game road trip, also got goals from Landeskog, Nazem Kadri and Mikko Rantanen. Colin Wilson had three assists.
Yanni Gourde and Victor Hedman scored for the Lightning, who returned home after a 3-2-1 road trip. Andrei Vasilevskiy stopped 18 shots.
“Look, we’ve been on the road pretty much the entire year since opening night,” Lightning coach Jon Cooper said. “There is a history in this league coming back off long road trips that you’re hoping you can get through the game. Did our guys battle, did they work? They did. We got burned by a good team on a few errors in execution.”
The Avalanche went up 2-1 when Jost got his second goal at 3:17 of the second. After Landeskog scored at 5:48, Jost made it 4-1 just 18 seconds later from in-close off a pass by J.T. Compher.
Compher had two assists.
Kadri, Rantanen, who deked out two defenders, and Hedman had third-period goals.
Tampa Bay’s Nikita Kucherov sent a penalty-shot backhander in the third over the net.
“We had enough chances,” Cooper said. “But all that matters is how many go into the net and they had way more than us.”
Tampa Bay’s top line of Kucherov (six), Steven Stamkos (seven) and Brayden Point (one) combined for 14 shots but were pointless.
NOTES: Referee Kelly Sutherland left early in the first period with an undisclosed injury and did not return. Colorado D Cale Makar lost his balance skating through the low slot during an in-close scoring chance and collided with Sutherland in the corner. … Avalanche C Nathan MacKinnon assisted on Landeskog’s goal and has a point in all eight games this season.
UP NEXT:
Avalanche: At St. Louis on Monday night.
Lightning: Host Pittsburgh Wednesday night in the second of three straight home games.
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