NEWARK, N.J. – The New Jersey Devils finished the New York Islanders’ work of the night before, erasing a three-goal lead to beat the Colorado Avalanche, 5-3, on Tuesday night at Prudential Center.

The postgame consensus was it was one of the Avalanche’s poorer efforts. Forward Mikko Rantanen, who scored Tuesday, called the Devils the faster, more physical team.

“I know we wanted to try to weather the storm, but they just kept coming and we couldn’t find the answer tonight,” Rantanen said.

“Very disappointing.”

The Islanders nearly came all the way back from a 5-1 deficit Monday but the Avalanche held them off for their only win in the past four games.

Nathan Bastian scored New Jersey’s fourth unanswered goal during a third-period power play, but most of the damage was done earlier in a stretch of just over eight minutes.

After Cale Makar made it 3-0, the Avalanche couldn’t seem to get a shot through traffic. The Devils took the puck off a shin guard and down the ice, where Tomas Tatar tapped in a second attempt to make it 3-1.

Ty Smith then sent the puck sailing over the outstretched arm of Colorado defenseman Samuel Girard and wiggling between Darcy Kuemper and the goalpost. Damon Severson’s power-play goal evened the score and made it an entirely new game with 2:39 left in the second period.

The penalty kill had to deal with penalties to Nazem Kadri, Jack Johnson and Gabriel Landeskog.

“I don’t think it would have mattered. It didn’t help us, that’s for sure,” coach Jared Bednar said. “But it didn’t get any better after that (and) wasn’t any better before that.

“I thought we were terrible, even in the first period.”

Power-play goals from MacKinnon and Rantanen gave the Avalanche a 2-0 lead going into the first intermission. MacKinnon watched the puck pop up above the crossbar. He swatted it out of midair and sent it bouncing past New Jersey goaltender Nico Daws (23 saves).

Later, Rantanen was waiting to bank a shot off the post and in. Makar helped set it up, pushing his assist streak to 13 games – a new franchise record.

“I don’t think we got any momentum in the whole 60 minutes,” Rantanen said. “Probably only those power plays were the ones that got us momentum. Other than that, I think we were awful tonight.

“There’s only one way from here, and it’s forward and better results. It was disappointing tonight.”

Kadri drew a penalty with 3:14 left in regulation and gave the Avalanche a chance to tie the game. A 2-on-1 chance before Kuemper headed to the bench for the extra attacker was too far ahead of Michael McLeod. With Kuemper gone, Yegor Sharangovich lobbed in an empty netter.

Kuemper was pulled from his previous start Saturday. He made 38 saves against the Devils as the Avalanche were outshot in all three periods.

“Look at the chances we gave up. I ain’t putting it on the goalie,” Bednar said.

“Our team looked tired.”

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