In a crazy, chaotic gong show of a hockey game, Nathan MacKinnon made the loudest noise, with an insane goal that kept the Avalanche’s season alive.

Colorado beat Dallas 7-4 on a Thursday night that made emotional wrecks of all 18,099 spectators in Ball Arena.

Don’t ask me how the Avs won.

Never ask how.

Only ask how many.

And seven goals proved to be more than enough for Colorado to force a winner-take-all Game 7 at 6 p.m. Saturday at American Airlines Center in Dallas (ABC).

But I do feel compelled to ask:

How the heck did MacKinnon light the lamp with the most clutch, crucial goal of this Colorado season?

“It was a freak goal,” MacKinnon said. “Super lucky.”

With the score tied 4-4 in the third period of one of the wildest playoff games in NHL history, MacKinnon saved the Avs from postseason elimination with a score 9 minutes, 4 seconds, into the tense final frame.

It was an unassisted goal and a moment of magic that should make voters repent for not making MacKinnon a Hart Trophy finalist.

After a raging bull charge at Dallas goalie Jake Oettinger, MacKinnon flipped the puck toward traffic in the crease.

After a multi-player pile up in front of Oettinger, the puck popped out of the wreckage like a pop can being spit out from under the tires of a semi truck rolling down the highway.

When Stars center Sam Steel tried to clear the puck out of danger, it found the chest of Dallas linemate Colin Blackwell and deflected into the net for an own goal.

Did MacKinnon and the Avs get lucky? Darn skippy.

But finding a way to survive and elimination game means never having to say you're sorry.

“You earn your bounces in this game,” Avs captain Gabe Landeskog said.

The gong in Game 6 rang early and often. What started as a Colorado rout waiting to happen turned into momentum swings so wild it was difficult for both teams to maintain emotional equilibrium.

So frustrated in this series that he shattered a stick during morning skate only hours before an elimination game, Val Nichushkin found a replacement blade and a little luck in the opening period.

After a beautiful break into the attack zone by Landeskog and an even sweeter cross-ice pass from Brock Nelson, a shot by Choo Choo from the circle went completely off the tracks. But the puck found the back of Dallas defenseman Ilya Lyubushkin. And the deflection found the back of the net.

And just like that, a little more than 6 minutes into the first period, all the tension in Ball Arena instantly transformed into a party-rock-in-the-house-tonight vibe.

When the Avs skated off the ice for the first intermission with a 2-0 lead, nobody in the building could’ve anticipated Game 6 was about to turn into a beautiful mess.

Faster than you could say uno, dos, tres, cuatro, Dallas scored four goals in the second period.

On only nine shots.

It was a pathetic display of defense by Colorado, which played so desperately it became reckless hockey.

At high speeds, the Stars blew through the blue line like they had an E-Z pass. With Dallas buzzing him, the head of Avalanche goalie Mackenzie Blackwood was spinning like a Tilt-a-Whirl.

None of the four goals he surrendered in the period were soft. But Blackwood also did nothing to calm the chaos. And the Moose got loose. Former Avs star Mikko Rantanen not only tallied three assists, his goal late in the frame staked Dallas to a 4-3 lead heading into Period 3.

“We fell asleep a couple times,” MacKinnon said.

Colorado had blown leads to Dallas in two previous losses in the series.

In Game 2, the Avs were rolling in "Big D" toward a 2-0 lead in the series, but blew a lead in the final 10 minutes of regulation and lost in overtime.

Back on home ice for Game 3, the Avs were all buttoned down, looking sweet with a one-goal lead in the middle of the third period, and lost again in overtime.

Given a chance to choke again, the Avs stood up, not to be counted out.

“We kept fighting,” Landeskog said. “No quit.”

In years past, the Avs wanted to hoist the Stanley Cup so badly that in the playoffs coach Jared Bednar said he saw players “freeze up a little bit.”

Is this Colorado team truly built different?

With a win-or-go-home Game 7 in Dallas on Saturday, we’re fixing to find out.