Colorado Avalanche goaltender Scott Wedgewood stopped all 22 shots faced in a 1-0 Colorado victory over the Chicago Blackhawks on Sunday night. This gave the Avalanche (16-1-5) back-to-back shutouts on the road after Mackenzie Blackwood turned aside all 35 shots he faced the night before against the Nashville Predators. The Avalanche have now won nine games in a row.
The lone goal of the game came off the stick of Cale Makar as the 27-year-old defenseman scored his ninth goal of the season in the second period after he found a rebound off Chicago goaltender Spencer Knight on his stick and fired a wrist shot off the post and in behind Knight. Colorado forward Tristen Nielsen was credited with his first NHL point with the assist.
Cale Makar makes no mistake on the rebound! 🥬 pic.twitter.com/LeR2SoovfN
— NHL (@NHL) November 24, 2025
Knight was once again excellent in net as his only hiccup was a long rebound off the stick of Nielsen after a turnover in Chicago’s end. The former 13th overall pick in the 2019 NHL Draft is now supporting a .924 save percentage through 15 games of action this season. Knight was bombarded in the middle frame with 19 Colorado shots.
Chicago’s head coach, Jeff Blashill, was impressed with the Blackhawks’ performance last night knowing a 1-0 loss to a potential Stanley Cup contender is not something to be disappointed over in November.
“I think if we repeat that performance, we’re winning lots of games,” Blashill said in his postgame presser. “The other team is going to push back, that’s just the reality of life, but if you look at where we were to start the game, I thought we did an excellent job in our structure, excellent job of some of the things we talked about this morning that we didn’t do in Buffalo. We had real, real, real chances in the first, I think the better of the chances in the comparisons between the two periods, and didn’t score. But we stayed with it.”
Analysis
Chicago defenseman Alex Vlasic played his 200th NHL game last night and played an excellent game versus a Stanley Cup-winning level team. The 24-year-old Wilmette, Illinois, native did an excellent job using his long reach and did a nice job with his gaps against speedier forwards and defensemen. Fans need to remember it can take defensemen some time to learn the speed of the game and the “tricks” that make for a top-level defender at the NHL level, and Vlasic is starting to show those improvements.
Knight continues to be the backbone for the Blackhawks. It will be interesting to see how long before the organization brings up his former USHL teammate, Drew Commesso, from Rockford. Commesso has shown signs of brilliance up the road from Chicago and continues to develop a calmness with his movements that shows he’s starting to believe in his talents that made him the second goalie picked in the 2020 NHL Draft.