Lightning vs Avalanche Picks & Props

Colorado can atone for its loss when it faces the Tampa Bay Lightning on Wednesday night to close out a three-game homestand in Denver.

The Avalanche bounced back from an 0-4-0 start to the season to reel off five straight wins before falling flat against Chicago. Now without another forward, they face a Tampa Bay team that has won two straight.

Leading goal-scorer Ross Colton left Monday's loss after blocking a shot in the second period, and will miss six-to-eight weeks with a broken foot, coach Jared Bednar announced Wednesday.

Colton has eight goals in 10 games to bolster the offense while top-line forwards are out. Artturi Lehkonen (shoulder), Gabriel Landeskog (knee) and Valeri Nichushkin (suspension) have not played this season and Jonathan Drouin has been out since suffering an upper-body injury in the opener.

"Well, next man up mentality continues with us," forward Mikko Rantanen said. "I think unfortunate that we're missing a lot of forwards at the moment, but I don't think we can do anything about it, other than just focus on the game, how we can play and how we can grab some points in these games.

"Obviously not ideal, like you said, but we just got to battle, as a team get together -- leaders, lead the way and try to get wins."

Stars Cale Makar and Nathan MacKinnon have shouldered the scoring load. Both have at least one point in each of the first 10 games; Makar has 17 points (three goals, 14 assists) and MacKinnon has 16 (five goals, 11 assists).

Also, Bednar said that winger Miles Wood will miss seven-to-10 days with an upper-body injury.

More important, the Avalanche need to play better than Monday night.

"We're not looking at moral victories here right now," Bednar said. "It wasn't our best game. Needed to be better and it wasn't. It's two in a row."

Tampa Bay is coming off an emotional 3-2 overtime win over Nashville on Monday night when it honored former captain Steven Stamkos, who helped the Lightning win two Stanley Cups. After 16 seasons in Tampa, Stamkos returned for the first time since signing with the Predators in the offseason.

Tampa Bay spoiled his return, but like the Avalanche wasn't pleased with the overall performance ahead of a four-game road trip.

"We have to be more consistent over 60 minutes," Lightning captain Victor Hedman said. "We're playing some really tough teams. We can't take a period off here and there, we have to be on it for 60 minutes. We have to go out there and execute our game plan."

One area that can improve is special teams. Tampa Bay led the NHL in power-play percentage last season but is just 5-for-31 this year. The Lightning are also struggling on the penalty kill; they rank 28th at 71.9 percent.

That could be an issue against Colorado's potent power play. The Avalanche are third in the NHL at 36.4 percent and have 12 power-play goals despite missing four of their top players on that unit.

--Field Level Media