Devils vs. Avalanche: Jake Allen Stops 31 on His 500-Game Tribute Night as New Jersey Holds Off a Late Push

Jake Allen started his Tuesday night with a pregame ceremony and finished it under siege. In between, he gave the Devils exactly what they needed.

Allen made 31 saves, Luke Evangelista had a goal and an assist in his return to the lineup, and the New Jersey Devils beat the Colorado Avalanche 4-3 at Prudential Center. New Jersey led 4-1 with under four minutes to play before Artturi Lehkonen scored twice to make the final much more stressful than it needed to be.

A Night That Started With a Tribute

Before puck drop, the Devils honored Allen for playing his 500th NHL game, a milestone he reached on Oct. 10, according to NHL.com. The 34-year-old was making his second straight start, and he made a point of soaking it in.

"I told myself just to enjoy that moment," Allen said. "Winning the Stanley Cup (with the St. Louis Blues in 2019) and tonight are the two highlights of my career for sure."

Evangelista, back after missing three games, wasted no time. At 6:40 of the first he ripped a wrist shot down the middle of the slot past Scott Wedgewood for his third goal of the season, with Nico Hischier and Jonas Siegenthaler assisting. NHL.com noted he came to New Jersey from Nashville in a trade on Sept. 1.

Makar Does Makar Things

Colorado answered with the kind of sequence that makes highlight editors weep with joy. Cale Makar, starting from the right point, threaded the puck between Timo Meier's skates, blew by Jack Hughes and set up Gabriel Landeskog, who was waiting by the right post with nobody near him. Landeskog finished at 14:32 for his fourth goal.

That goal carried weight beyond the scoreboard. According to the AP, the Avalanche captain was sidelined for more than three seasons after major surgery on his right knee, then came back to post 14 goals in 60 games last season.

The Turning Point: Chisholm's Lucky Bounce

The game stayed tied until 12:33 of the second, when Declan Chisholm let a snap shot go from the left point and it ticked off Brock Nelson's stick in the slot on the way past Wedgewood. It was Chisholm's first goal as a Devil, NHL.com noted, after New Jersey acquired the defenseman from Washington in a June 25 trade.

Was it pretty? No. Did it hold up as the winner? Yes. Hockey does not hand out style points, and Devils coach Sheldon Keefe liked how his team kept pushing through a night of near misses. "When we couldn't make good on the chances that we had, we just stayed with it and didn't change our game," he said.

Allen Survives the Chaos

The third period opened with Colorado swarming. Just 38 seconds in, Allen denied Nathan MacKinnon and Makar just outside the right post, according to NHL.com, and then the crease turned into a pileup. He made 19 saves in the third alone.

"After the first two saves it was just chaos," Allen said. "Those are the moments that we need to get. If they score right there, that changes the game."

Instead, the Devils scored. Arseny Gritsyuk took off with a neutral-zone puck, went straight through the pair of Makar and Devon Toews and tucked a backhand past Wedgewood at 4:39. Evangelista loved it. "That was foul," he said, which, judging by what came next, is very much a compliment. "I was so fired up for him on the bench."

Jesper Boqvist made it 4-1 with an empty-net goal at 16:05, and that should have been that.

Lehkonen Makes It Interesting

Lehkonen did not get the memo. He scored at 16:47 to make it 4-2, then struck again at 19:55 with Wedgewood pulled to make it 4-3. Those were his seventh and eighth goals of the season, and eight leads the Avalanche, per the AP.

It was not enough, and Colorado coach Jared Bednar did not pretend otherwise. "We looked slow and unenergetic," he said. "We were losing races, losing battles."

Landeskog saw the same thing. "It just felt like we were reactionary instead of just going," he said.

The Players Who Shaped It

Jake Allen: 31 saves on 34 shots, 19 of them in the third period. The AP noted he improved to 4-2-0.

Luke Evangelista: A goal, an assist and a postgame recipe for success. "When we had our success tonight, we were direct, we put pucks behind them, hounded their defense, and turned over pucks," he said.

Scott Wedgewood: 37 saves against his former team. The AP noted he entered the night 5-0-0 with a 1.52 goals-against average against the Devils, so this one stung.

Cale Makar: Two assists, four blocked shots and 22:34 of ice time. NHL.com noted he became the eighth player in Avalanche history with 80 career multiassist games.

Stats That Matter

• 41-34: New Jersey's shot advantage. NHL.com noted Meier alone had eight shots on goal.
• 37-20: The Devils' edge in faceoff wins. Hischier won 12 of his 20 draws.
• 0 for 1: Each team's power play. This game was played almost entirely at even strength.
• 1,015: Consecutive games for Avalanche defenseman Brent Burns, per the AP. He sits 49 games shy of matching Phil Kessel's NHL ironman record, and he is 41.

What It Means

New Jersey moves to 5-4-0 with 10 points and is 4-2-0 at home, bouncing back from a 4-2 loss at Washington. NHL.com noted the Devils have won three of their past four. Anaheim visits on Thursday.

Colorado falls to 5-4-1 with 11 points and has lost three of its past four, per the AP, including a 3-2 loss in Philadelphia on Monday. Colorado was playing the second half of a back-to-back, and it looked like it for long stretches. The Avalanche host Tampa Bay on Friday.

Closing Take

Allen said he would remember this night forever, and the ceremony was only part of it. The other part was standing tall in a third period that tilted hard toward his net, through a goalmouth scramble that looked like a rugby scrum on skates. More than 500 games in, he still knows how to make a lead last, even when it ends up a lot thinner than it looked at 16:05.

Stats from the official box score via ESPN. Game details from the Associated Press; postgame quotes and notes as reported by NHL.com.