Former Avalanche Players Lead Nashville Predators’ 6-2 Win Over Colorado
Ryan O’Reilly had four points, and Justus Annunen stopped 19 shots as Nashville beat Colorado 6-2.
Five former Colorado players featured in Nashville’s 6-2 win over the Avalanche on Sunday, with Ryan O’Reilly delivering the standout performance. He scored twice and added two assists, a four-point night that helped the Predators turn a division matchup into a rough outing for their visitors.
The loss put Colorado’s defensive struggles back in focus. The Avalanche couldn’t score in the first period, and their offense never found enough traction to keep pace. Head coach Jared Bednar said the game looked as if Colorado had played the night before, even though Nashville was the team coming off a back-to-back.
O’Reilly sets the pace
O’Reilly’s connection to Colorado goes back to his time with the Avalanche, which ended after the 2014-15 season. His four points against his former team made him the most productive of Nashville’s former Colorado players on Sunday. There had been discussion of a possible return to the Avalanche last season to add scoring depth, but that move didn’t happen.
Instead, O’Reilly led the attack from Nashville’s side. His two goals and two assists gave Colorado a direct reminder of the value of a center who can contribute across the scoresheet. The result also made the reunion especially lopsided: the Predators scored six times, while the Avalanche managed two goals.
Jack Drury, who joined Nashville in a late-June trade, also scored. He finished with one goal on two shots. Colorado sent Drury, Chase Bradley and a third-round pick in 2029 to the Predators for Fedor Svechkov and Zachary L’Heureux. Drury was coming off a season in which he recorded 10 goals and 17 assists, and signed a five-year extension worth a $4.5 million average annual value four days after the trade.
His departure left Colorado without a depth forward who had been able to contribute both goals and assists. The deal brought younger players and a future draft pick back to the Avalanche, while Drury moved quickly into a longer-term role in Nashville. Sunday’s goal added a pointed footnote to that exchange, though one game doesn’t settle how the trade will look over time.
Annunen turns aside 19 shots
Justus Annunen started in net for Nashville against his former club and stopped 19 of Colorado’s 21 shots, finishing with a .905 save percentage. The Avalanche didn’t generate enough volume to put sustained pressure on him. At the other end, Nashville directed 35 shots at Scott Wedgewood, a disparity that captured how the game tilted toward the Predators.
Alexander Kerfoot had a quieter night by the numbers. In 17:28 of ice time over 23 shifts, he recorded one shot. The former Avalanche forward spent two seasons in Colorado and was listed as Nashville’s third-line center and a member of its first power-play unit. The Predators scored four power-play goals, giving that unit a major role in the final margin.
Ross Colton, another former Colorado depth forward, recorded an assist and put two shots on goal. During his Avalanche tenure, he played both center and wing. His contribution against Colorado wasn’t as large as O’Reilly’s, but the assist added to a night when Nashville’s former Avalanche players were involved in the result in several different ways.
Colorado has defensive work ahead
The Avalanche have high-end talent on the blue line and up front, including Cale Makar, Devon Toews, Nathan MacKinnon and Martin Necas. That group didn’t translate into enough offense Sunday, while Colorado’s defensive play again came under scrutiny. The team had also been described as struggling to meet its defensive standards through the opening 12 games.
One lopsided result doesn’t define a season, and Colorado still had 72 games to play at the point described in the source. But the shot gap and Nashville’s four power-play goals give the Avalanche specific areas to address: limiting the chances against, managing special teams and getting more pucks toward the opposing net. With two days between games, the team had time to review the loss before its next outing.
Nashville got a major performance from O’Reilly, a goal from Drury, and a steady start from Annunen. For Colorado, the immediate takeaway is less about the familiar names on the other bench than the imbalance they exposed. The Avalanche will need sharper defending and more offensive pressure if they want this kind of uneven night to remain an early-season exception.
