Nazem Kadri allowed his tem­per to out­shine his talent.

One sea­son with the Avalanche flipped that hock­ey rep­u­ta­tion on its head.

“The smile says it all,” Kadri said Wednes­day, of course, with a huge grin.

He spoke after Col­orado advanced past Ari­zona in the first round of the Stan­ley Cup play­offs with a Game 5 blowout, 7–1, with Kadri extend­ing his stretch of bril­liant play in the Edmon­ton bub­ble. He scored twice in the first peri­od to bring his post­sea­son total to six goals — tied for most in the NHL (Bo Hor­vat, Van­cou­ver). And, per­haps as impor­tant, Kadri advanced to the sec­ond round with­out spend­ing a sin­gle minute in the penal­ty box.

It’s a com­plete role rever­sal from the 2018 and ’19 NHL post­sea­sons, when Kadri, while play­ing for Toron­to, received mul­ti-game sus­pen­sions for ille­gal first-round hits in con­sec­u­tive play­offs. The Avs trad­ed for Kadri in July 2019, with plans to har­ness that aggres­sion into a depend­able but grit­ty cen­ter to anchor the sec­ond line.

“I talked with Naz when he first got to us a lit­tle bit about his his­to­ry in Toron­to, some of the penal­ties and his rep­u­ta­tion,” Avalanche coach Jared Bed­nar said. “He stat­ed right away that he had made some mis­takes there, that he was sort of past that and it wouldn’t be a prob­lem. I said … ‘I want you to play your game, be phys­i­cal and sort of toe the line. Be high­ly com­pet­i­tive, be a dif­fer­ence-mak­er for us, but I don’t want you in the (penal­ty) box all the time. You’re too big a piece to our team.’”

It appears Kadri’s image makeover is complete.

“You want to learn from your mis­takes and I’m try­ing to mature as a per­son, a play­er, and as a team­mate,” Kadri said. “I’m try­ing to stay calm out there and com­posed. I want to help my team win and I think stay­ing in games would do that.”

Kadri was most dom­i­nant as part of the Avs’ top pow­er-play unit. He net­ted four PP goals in the Ari­zona series, which ranks the most by an Avalanche play­er in the post­sea­son since Joe Sakic scored five pow­er-play goals in 2001 over four rounds.

“Naz has real­ly found a way to impact our hock­ey club in a great way,” Avs cap­tain Gabe Lan­deskog said. “He’s that lit­tle extra sand­pa­per that I felt we need­ed last year. He’s one of those guys who can help out in all areas of the game.”

Back in July, it would have been easy for Col­orado to pass on Kadri con­sid­er­ing his sor­did play­off his­to­ry. Instead of cre­at­ing headaches, though, Kadri has estab­lished him­self as a con­sis­tent point pro­duc­er with the matu­ri­ty of an estab­lished leader this postseason.

“All the kudos belong to the team,” Kadri said. “They opened up their lock­er room and have made me feel at home since Day 1. They’ve done a great job of that and embraced my play and who I am off of the ice. Of course, I’ve been around for a while, so I try to take on more of a lead­er­ship role.

“The team and the orga­ni­za­tion has accept­ed me and allowed me to do what I do best. That’s some­thing that’s much appreciated.”