Denver, CO (SportsNetwork.com) - Kevin Hayes finished with a goal and two assists as the New York Rangers defeated the Colorado Avalanche 6-3 on Thursday.
Carl Hagelin scored the go-ahead goal past the midway point of the third period, Rick Nash scored his NHL-leading 34th goal of the season and Dan Boyle, Mats Zuccarello and Ryan McDonagh also lit the lamp for the Rangers, who won their second in a row.
Cam Talbot made 26 saves in his fifth straight start in place of injured starter Henrik Lundqvist.
Jarome Iginla tallied a goal and an assist, Gabriel Landeskog and Jan Hedja scored and Semyon Varlamov stopped 25-of-30 shots in Colorado's fourth straight loss.
"Our confidence was not there," Avalanche head coach Patrick Roy said. "My job is to turn this around. We do not like to lose after coming back from two (goals) down."
The Avalanche tied the game with two quick goals midway through the third.
After Iginla forced a turnover off Martin St. Louis in the Rangers zone, Talbot made a kick save on Maxime Talbot's shot from the slot, but Iginla was there to put the loose puck in the net for a 3-2 game 6:43 into the third.
Hejda drifted into the slot and had his initial shot blocked, but he sent the rebound past Talbot for a tied game with 9:16 remaining.
The Rangers regained the lead just two minutes later as Hagelin's shot in tight made it a 4-3 game.
"Obviously it gave us momentum," Hagelin said of his goal. "It was a tough 10 minutes. We were soft and they had room to skate."
Nash sealed the win by emerging from behind the net and firing a quick turnaround shot past Varlamov with 4:18 to play, and McDonagh scored on an empty net to account for the final score.
The Rangers dominated the Avs in the first period as they outshot them 13-5 and opened the scoring after Boyle deked past Varlamov and finished the sequence on a smooth backhander with 3:30 left in the stanza.
Hayes skated into the zone up the right side with the puck on his backhand, shifted the puck to his forehand at the goalmouth and slipped it past Varlamov for a 2-0 score 1:47 into the second.
Colorado got on the board at 12:46 of the second after Landeskog buried a rebound past Talbot, but Zuccarello's wrister four minutes later restored New York's two-goal lead.
Game Notes
Zuccarello extended his point streak to seven games ... New York improved to 26-5-2 when scoring first ... Avalanche forward Ryan O'Reilly played in his 400th NHL game ... Iginla tied Mark Recchi for 19th on the all-time goals list with 577.
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