Alexander Kerfoot scored two goals, Tyson Barrie had a goal and an assist, and the Colorado Avalanche scored six unanswered goals to beat the Edmonton Oilers 6-2 in Denver on Tuesday night.

Nathan MacKinnon, Colin Wilson and Sven Andrighetto also scored, and Semyon Varlamov had 27 saves for Colorado (37-29-14, 88 points).

The Avalanche took firm control of the second wild-card spot in the Western Conference, as the Arizona Coyotes (84 points) lost to Los Angeles later Tuesday. With two games remaining for both teams, Arizona must win out while Colorado loses out to get into the postseason on a tiebreaker. The Minnesota Wild, who beat Winnipeg on Tuesday, were officially eliminated from contention.

Milan Lucic and Darnell Nurse scored goals, and Mikko Koskinen stopped 23 shots for Edmonton.

The Oilers (34-37-9, 77 points) looked like they were going to run away with the game in the first period, when they scored twice in a span of 3:41 and prevented the Avalanche from putting a shot on goal for the first 10:56.

Lucic got the scoring going when he tipped a blast from the point past Varlamov at 9:20 for his sixth of the season. Nurse made it 2-0 later in the first when he beat Varlamov with a sharp shot from the right side at 13:01. It was his ninth of the season.

Colorado, which was outshot 10-8 in the first period, dominated the second period. MacKinnon got it going with a power-play goal at 4:56, not long after the Avalanche failed to convert on a 5-on-3 power play. He split three Edmonton defenders and beat Koskinen with a snapshot for his career-high 40th goal of the season and the 400th point of his career.

Exactly a minute later, Barrie tied it when he used two Edmonton players as a screen and scored his 13th of the season.

The Avalanche wasted little time in taking the lead. Erik Johnson's shot from the right went off Matt Nieto to the other side of the net, where Kerfoot tapped it in at 7:43.

Colorado completed the strong period when Wilson used a spin move at the left circle to create space and then snapped a backhander from the slot at 12:04. It was his 12th of the season.

The Avalanche finished off the rally when Kerfoot scored his 15th goal at 7:30 of the third period, and Andrighetto got his seventh goal of the season at 15:07. Gabriel Landeskog had two assists.

--Field Level Media