PITTSBURGH — Martin Nečas scored twice in the second period Tuesday night, the second one during a 29-second two-man advantage, and the Colorado Avalanche held on to beat the Dallas Stars 3-2 at American Airlines Center in the first half of a home-and-home series.
Roope Hintz pulled Dallas within a goal 3:17 into the third period. In the second, he had dropped the gloves with Nathan MacKinnon for the first fight of his NHL career.
Dallas finished the third period with three shots on goal and fell to 2-3-1, while Colorado improved to 4-2-0.
Tyler Seguin scored for the second straight game, this time on the power play, three days after his first goal since tearing his ACL in Pittsburgh. He also set up Hintz’s goal.
Miro Heiskanen had 2 assists, and Jake Oettinger made 22 saves on 25 shots.
For Colorado, Mackenzie Blackwood stopped 24 of 26 shots. MacKinnon had 2 assists, giving him 12 points in six games.
Stars coach Glen Gulutzan put the gap at 5-on-5, where Hintz’s goal was the only one Dallas scored all night.
“Two good teams playing. I thought it was a really good hockey game,” Gulutzan said. “I thought we were slightly better. We need to put something home five-on-five and capitalize on some of our chances that we did create.”
“I thought that was the difference,” Gulutzan continued. “They capitalized on the ones we gave them, and we didn’t capitalize on the ones they gave us.”
Dallas played without Wyatt Johnston, a late scratch with an illness. Johnston had played in 333 straight regular-season games, 395 counting the playoffs, since his NHL debut on Oct. 13, 2022.
Gulutzan said after the game that Johnston came down ill right before puck drop and will not travel to Denver for Wednesday’s rematch.
The Stars dressed 11 forwards and seven defensemen, with Kyle Capobianco entering the lineup. Matt Duchene is out about three months after core muscle surgery the team announced Monday.
Joel Kiviranta is not expected back from a lower-body injury until Wednesday, The Dallas Morning News reported.
Colorado was without Cale Makar, who stayed in Denver with his wife, Tracy, as the couple awaits the birth of twins. Makar, a two-time Norris Trophy winner, has 3 goals and 4 assists for 7 points in 5 games this season.
The Avalanche also lost Zachary L’Heureux to an upper-body injury before the game and opened with 11 forwards and six defensemen. Avalanche coach Jared Bednar said L’Heureux’s injury “came out of nowhere.”
Roope Hintz And Nathan MacKinnon Drop The Gloves
Hintz and MacKinnon had battled each other through the first 25 minutes before the gloves came off in the second period. MacKinnon went to the Colorado locker room for facial repairs and was off the bench for more than seven minutes of the period.
The Avalanche were already short. Fedor Svechkov fought Radek Faksa in the first period after Faksa’s hit on Jaden Schwartz and was assessed a two-minute instigator minor, a five-minute fighting major, and a 10-minute misconduct.
Colorado played almost 17 minutes with 10 forwards, and for more than five minutes of the second period it had nine.
Last season, Hintz tore his hamstring after getting tangled up with MacKinnon on March 6 at American Airlines Center. He missed the rest of the regular season and the Stars’ six-game first-round loss to the Minnesota Wild. Hintz finished 2025-26 with 15 goals and 29 assists for 44 points in 53 games.
Hintz was not available to reporters after the game. Seguin was a little surprised to see him fight at all.
“I mean, he’s a competitive guy,” Seguin said. “I think his talent and technique in the fight maybe was the surprise, but good on him.”
It was MacKinnon’s second fight in Colorado’s first six games. Seguin liked what the scrap showed about the Stars’ bench, even if he wants Hintz to pick his spots.
“It’s awesome to see us compete,” Seguin explained. “Don’t want him to fight too much, but it’s cool to see tonight.”
For MacKinnon, the fight grew out of the shifts the two centers had just played against each other.
“Two guys playing hard. (A) couple slashes and we fought,” MacKinnon said. “It was kind of an innocent play last year. I don’t know. You’d have to ask him, I guess.”
MacKinnon had bandages across his nose after the game, and a scab from a high stick in Winnipeg last week had reopened during the bout, The Denver Gazette reported.
“My visor cut me, but he definitely got me with a couple though too,” MacKinnon explained. “Big guy and he definitely got me with a couple good punches too.”
Martin Nečas Scores Twice After Tyler Seguin Ties It
Colorado opened the scoring at 11:32 of the first period. A point shot by Josh Manson hit MacKinnon’s skate, and Artturi Lehkonen swiped the loose puck over Oettinger’s pad.
Seguin tied it 1-1 on the power play at 19:06, when his pass for Mikko Rantanen at the back post went in off Lehkonen’s skate. It was Dallas’ first home power-play goal of the season in eight tries.
Nečas and MacKinnon worked a give-and-go 3:05 into the second, and Nečas one-timed the return pass to put Colorado back ahead 2-1.
He scored again at 16:07, with four seconds left in the two-man advantage. Oettinger stopped a point shot from Devon Toews, and Gabriel Landeskog moved the rebound across to Nečas, who finished from a sharp angle.
Blackwood made a glove save on a Sam Steel breakaway in the second period. He had allowed five goals Saturday in a 6-3 home loss to the Toronto Maple Leafs, and Bednar said Tuesday that Blackwood “had a great night, probably his best performance of the year.”
After the Toronto loss, Bednar had said Colorado needed Blackwood to make a save. Blackwood went home that night and asked himself whether he had been in the best position on every shot.
“It was a hard game to play, all they get is grade-A (chances),” Blackwood said. “My job is to make saves, so of course I’m going to want to win the game and make one or two more saves to be in the game, but that’s not going to happen all the time.”
“For me, did I go home and think about that and go, ‘was I in the best possible position to make every save that I could?’” Blackwood continued. “If the answer is no, then what do I have to do to adjust to be better next time?”
Dallas got within one at 3:17 of the third. Seguin won a faceoff after a Colorado icing, Heiskanen kept the puck in the zone, and Seguin found Hintz from below the goal line for a one-timer inside the near post. It was Hintz’s second goal of the season.
Colorado entered the night averaging 5.2 goals per game, the most in the NHL. Dallas had allowed seven goals in five games, the fewest in the league.
Oettinger came in having allowed three goals in his previous four starts, two of them shutouts. He entered Tuesday 7-3-3 in his career against Colorado, with a 3.05 goals-against average and a .911 save percentage.
“Every time they come here or we go there, it feels like a playoff game,” Oettinger said before the game. “It’s going to be a good way to see where we’re at. We always want to win the division, and they didn’t let us last year.”
The Avalanche won the Central Division last season, finishing ahead of a Dallas team that went 50-20-12. With Makar out Tuesday, MacKinnon wanted a tighter game from Colorado.
“They got some guys out too, but it was a good win,” MacKinnon said. “I think we needed a good defensive win, and we played pretty solid tonight. Obviously, missing Cale isn’t fun. He’s pretty good.”
Gulutzan had welcomed two straight nights against Colorado before Tuesday’s game, with Dallas coming off a 2-1 shootout loss Saturday in Pittsburgh.
“I honestly think where our team is at, it’s perfect,” Gulutzan explained. “We haven’t played our best hockey, but nothing brings out the best in you like a great opponent, and we’re going to face them twice. I think this comes at a great time to get us into our best game.”
The teams meet again Wednesday at Ball Arena in Denver, with puck drop at 7:30 p.m. CT on TNT. Dallas won both of its games in Denver last season in shootouts, 5-4 on Oct. 11, 2025, and 2-1 on March 18. The Stars visit the Chicago Blackhawks on Saturday.
