GLENDALE, Ariz. — Mikko Rantanen scored his 18th goal of the season and the Colorado Avalanche won their seventh game in a row by beating the Arizona Coyotes 5-1 on Monday night.
Philipp Grubauer, playing in his 200th NHL game, stopped 31 shots for Colorado. In net throughout the winning streak, Grubauer set a career high with his 19th victory of the season.
Joonas Donskoi scored two late goals, including an empty-netter. Pierre-Eduoard Bellemare and Nazem Kadri also scored for the Avalanche.
Coyotes captain Oliver Ekman-Larsson scored late in the third period, his first goal of the season.
Bellemare opened the scoring for Colorado, taking a feed in front from Matt Calvert behind the net to beat goalie Antii Raanta high at 14:22 of the first period.
Just 68 seconds later, Rantanen scored from the left side for a two-goal lead. Nathan MacKinnon and Gabriel Landeskog assisted. Rantanen leads all NHL players with 10 goals in March.
Kadri scored his 10th of the season midway through the second period — dominated by Colorado — to make it 3-0.
The Avalanche outshot the Coyotes 21-9 in the period and only some strong work by Raanta kept Arizona within range.
Arizona finally got on the board with Ekman-Larsson’s power-play goal with 3:41 left.
Coyotes defenseman Niklas Hjalmarsson exited after two periods with an upper-body injury.
UP NEXT
The teams meet again Tuesday night in Arizona.
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