Delayed by sunshine, Tahoe game will resume Saturday night (Matt Calvert)

Matt Calvert

Delayed by sunshine, Tahoe game will resume Saturday night

By Rick Sadowski

Feb 20, 2021 • 6:42 pm

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Baseball games are often delayed because of rain. Turns out, the NHL Outdoors game between the Avalanche and Vegas Golden Knights on Saturday was delayed due to sunshine.

Looking sharp in their Reverse Retro uniforms for the first time, the Avalanche will take a 1-0 lead into the second period when the game resumes under the lights at 9 p.m. PT at the rink built on the 18th fairway of the Edgewood Tahoe Resort on the southern shore of the lake in Stateline, Nevada.

The game will be broadcast by NBCSN, Sportsnet and TVA Sports.

The scenery was stunning with trees, Lake Tahoe and the snow-capped Sierra Nevada range in the background on a beautiful sun-splashed day.

Unfortunately, the sunshine proved to be too much for the ice, which was deteriorating throughout the period. After about a 70-minute delay following the period to determine how to handle the rest of the game, NHL commissioner Gary Bettman announced the decision was made to resume it Saturday night for safety reasons.

"The plan is simply that we concluded after consulting with our ice makers and both teams that we didn't think that it was safe or appropriate to continue this game at this time," Bettman said. "Some of the players wanted to continue playing. Other players were more concerned. I felt, as did the (NHL) Players' Association and everybody in hockey operations, and most importantly the ice makers, the most prudent thing to do was to discontinue the game now."

“There’s not much we can control of that,… Avalanche captain Gabriel Landeskog said in a NBC interview. “Even coming back here knowing that the first period was the way it was with some spots on the ice a little slushy, we were ready to go back out whenever they called us back.

“We kind of wanted to go back out, but it’s probably a good decision that we moved it to tonight and we’ll be ready to go.…

Samuel Girard, in his first game since Feb. 2, scored from the right face-off circle at 2:58 of the opening period off a cross-ice pass from Nathan MacKinnon. The puck went through goalie Marc-Andre Fleury's legs.

The Avalanche were unable to take advantage of a 5-on-3 power play for the final 1:23 of the period. They’ll have 3 seconds left on the two-man advantage to begin the second period followed by 37 seconds of a 5-on-4.

They outshot the Golden Knights 17-8.

“I don’t know what the afternoon’s going to look like for us, but we’ll go back (to the hotel), get something to eat maybe and lay down for a bit,… Landeskog said. “It’s not the normal, but we’ll figure it out. We were having fun out there.

“We’ll just kind of take it in stride. For us, we have a pretty positive outlook as a team. We’ll go back and we’ll do what we can, probably get a bite to eat, lay down, relax, and come back in a few hours and try to pick up where we left off and kind of start that routine back up, get back and start warming up, get in some treatment.

“It’ll be one to remember, that’s for sure.…

Girard, Landeskog and Tyson Jost were playing their first game after completing their COVID-19 protocols. Cale Makar and Matt Calvert are playing after recovering from upper-body injuries.

**********

Nathan MacKinnon wasn’t able to ace the par-3 17th hole of the golf course on Friday in the One Million Dollar Hole-in-One Challenge presented by Bridgestone.

It’s the same hole Joe Sakic aced during the American Century Celebrity Golf Championship in 2011.

If MacKinnon made it, the NHL would have donated $1 million to the NHL/NHLPA Learn to Play program. Instead, the league will donate $25,000.

“Joe called me up and asked if I wanted to do it,… MacKinnon said Saturday. “I didn’t really know what to expect.…

His attempt was aired by NBC during the first intermission Saturday.

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