COL 4, CBJ 1: On Night Honoring Cam Atkinson, Avalanche Overpower Blue Jackets with Three-Goal Second Period

By Will Chase on October 16, 2025 at 10:25 pm
Oct 16, 2025; Columbus, Ohio, USA; Colorado Avalanche goalie Scott Wedgewood (41) makes a save on the shot from Columbus Blue Jackets left wing Dmitri Voronkov (10) during the third period at Nationwide Arena.
© Russell LaBounty-Imagn Images
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The second period was the difference in this one.

A three-goal second period and 22 saves by Scott Wedgwood spurred the Colorado Avalanche past the Columbus Blue Jackets 4-1 on Thursday night at Nationwide Arena.

  1 2 3 F
COL 0 3 1 4
cbj 0 1 0 1

CBJ GOALS:
Provorov (P2, 1:36)

Valeri Nichushkin scored twice, Cale Makar had a goal and an assist, and Brock Nelson scored for Colorado.

Ivan Provorov scored for Columbus. Elvis Merzlikins made 33 saves.

Yegor Chinakhov made his season debut after Miles Wood left Monday's game with an upper-body injury. Wood will miss at least a week. Erik Gudbranson is day-to-day with an upper-body injury.

The Blue Jackets are in the middle of a six-game stretch against teams that made last year's playoffs.

As the Blue Jackets honored one of their own, Cam Atkinson, who signed a one-day contract on Thursday to retire as a member of the organization, here's how this one went with the Avalanche.

1st Period:

Both teams were scoreless through the first period of play. Colorado led in shots, 12-7.

2nd Period:

On what could be dubbed as 'Cam Atkinson Night,' it was a milestone game for a couple of big-time veterans.

(1:36 — CBJ Goal): Searching for the first goal of the game, Provorov tallied his first of the season in his 700th career game to give Columbus the 1-0 lead (Assist: Kirill Marchenko).

(10:34 — COL Goal): Makar, the reigning Norris Trophy winner, scored the tying goal in his 400th career game to make it 1-1 (Assists: Martin Necas, Artturi Lehkonen).

(10:34 — COL Goal): Nelson added to the Avalanche lead to make it 2-1 (Assists: Brent Burns, Josh Manson).

With 3:45 remaining in the second period, Dmitri Voronkov thought he had the potential game-tying goal, but the marker was immediately waived off by the ref for a hand pass. Voronkov even took the customary fist bumps along the bench.

3rd Period

The Blue Jackets pulled the goalie at 3:31 remaining in the third period and down two, to try to create some offense.

At 3:03, the Jackets once again thought they had their second goal, and once again the goal was immediately waived off for a hand pass as Cole Sillinger batted the puck with his hand to Damon Severson, who got the puck behind Wedgewood.

(18:07 — COL Goal): Nichushkin scored his second of the game with the net empty to salt this one away 4-1 (Assists: Gabriel Landeskog, Makar).

Colorado is 4-0-1 and has allowed one goal in each win, but as good as the Avalanche are, the Blue Jackets know they need to get on their game.

"We're all in the same league," Monahan said. "Same rules apply every game. It doesn't matter who you're playing. We got to play the same game.

"Tonight we didn't play our game. That's when it's going to cost you."

"The first three (games) we liked the way we played," Evason said. We didn't like how we played tonight. That's a good team, but probably gave them way too much respect and didn't get to our game, and play the way that we play.

"That's the disappointing part here tonight."

What are the positives to take out of Thursday's loss?

"Goalie was real good," Evason said. "Goalie was real good. Elvis was great."

It will be interesting to see the response from the team on Saturday.

"We were passive tonight," Evason said. "We were soft. We got to play hard. If we're going to win hockey games, we got to play hard. And we didn't play hard enough tonight in order to win."

COL GAME STATS CBJ
36 SHOTS 23
29 FACEOFFS 24
0/1 POWER PLAY 0/2
2/2 PENALTY KILL 1/1
13 HITS 12
20 GIVEAWAYS 22
6 TAKEAWAYS 2
14 BLOCKED SHOTS 20
ALL SITUATIONS ADVANCED STATS
5.17 EXPECTED GOALS 2.68
77 SHOT ATTEMPTS 56
45 SCORING CHANCES 27
18 HIGH-DANGER CHANCES 10
Data via NHL.com & NaturalStatTrick.com

Stat Chat:

  • An NHL veteran of 809 career games, Atkinson registered 489 career points (253 goals, 236 assists). Including stops with the Tampa Bay Lightning and Philadelphia Flyers, Atkinson spent 10 of his 13 NHL seasons with the Blue Jackets, scoring 402 points (213 goals, 189 assists) in 627 games.
     
  • Atkinson is second all-time in Blue Jackets history in points and goals. He's the franchise leader with 16 shorthanded goals, and is fifth in assists, third in power play goals (42), fourth in power play points (95), and third in games played. Atkinson is the all-time leader in playoff points (26), hat tricks (six), and is tied for the most goals in a season (41).
     
  • Columbus entered Thursday's game tied for first in the league in goals allowed (1 at 5v5). Thursday’s game was the first since opening night, Oct. 9, against the Nashville Predators, that they allowed a 5v5 goal. Having allowed seven shorthanded goals coming into Thursday’s game, Columbus was 1-for-1 on the penalty kill.

Up Next:

Columbus concludes its three-game home stand on Saturday against the Tampa Bay Lightning at Nationwide Arena at 7 p.m.

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Game Preview: Yegor Chinakhov Set For Season Debut As Blue Jackets Battle Avalanche At Nationwide Arena

Yegor Chinakhov is set for his season debut and Elvis Merzlikins is in net as the Columbus Blue Jackets face the Colorado Avalanche on Thursday night at Nationwide Arena.