<\/p>\n
LAST SEASON<\/p>\n
Most of the teams that used 40 or more players last season were rebuilding (SJS<\/a>), aging (PIT<\/a>), in the thick of a firesale (BOS<\/a>), or just plain bad (NSH<\/a>). It\u2019s remarkable, then, that the team at the very top of the list, with a whopping 49 used players, finished with 102 points and an automatic playoff berth. The Colorado Avalanche<\/a> didn\u2019t have a moment\u2019s peace last season but were often too talented for that to matter.<\/p>\n The Avs got off to a turbulent start to 2024-25 when incumbent starting goalie Alexandar Georgiev fell to pieces over the first two months of the season. Colorado GM Chris MacFarland had to move quickly to swap Georgiev and backup Justus Annunen out for Mackenzie Blackwood and Scott Wedgewood in separate trades, and the new guys did brilliantly well to turn the Avalanche\u2019s season around amid injuries and suspensions to several key forwards. Still, MacFarland wasn\u2019t done yet.<\/p>\n Satisfied that a Mikko Rantanen extension would destroy Colorado\u2019s chances of building a balanced roster around Nathan MacKinnon and Cale Makar (and perhaps aware that all $7-million of captain Gabriel Landeskog would be back on the books ahead of 2025-26), MacFarland and team president Joe Sakic made Rantanen the best player to be traded midseason since Joe Thornton by shipping him to the Carolina Hurricanes<\/a>.\u00a0<\/p>\n That decision looked great when it netted the team a nifty top-line winger in Martin Necas and created room for long-awaited Nazem Kadri replacement Brock Nelson. It backfired, however, when a discontented Rantanen swapped Carolina for the Avs\u2019 division rivals, the Dallas Stars<\/a>, after only a few weeks. Naturally, the Avalanche ran smack into Rantanen and the Stars in the first round, bowing out after their old friend went nuclear in Game 7. Will Colorado be better prepared to brave a tough Central Division bracket without so much in-season drama in 2025-26, or was moving on from \u2018the Moose\u2019 a critical blunder?<\/p>\n KEY ADDITIONS & DEPARTURES<\/p>\n Additions<\/p>\n Victor Olofsson, LW Departures<\/p>\n Jonathan Drouin, LW (NYI) OFFENSE<\/p>\n There is no stopping Nathan MacKinnon once he gets up to speed, which takes about half a second. MacKinnon is too explosive to be discouraged from driving to the middle of the ice, where he creates scoring opportunities at a relentless pace (first in SOG since 2015). \u2018Mack\u2019 is third among NHLers in points and per-game scoring since his breakout season in 2017-18, and the Avs have finished no lower than 10th in offense in the years since.\u00a0<\/p>\n Necas\u2019s blistering shot and ability to match MacKinnon stride-for-stride made them a frightening tandem on the rush after the big trade. The mercurial Czech\u2019s production (career-high 83 P) is finally living up to the eye test. Artturi Lehkonen\u2019s work rate on the wall and around the crease makes the crafty Finn the perfect garbage man (27 G in 69 GP) for his speedy linemates, with whom he should start the year.\u00a0<\/p>\n On the second line, Landeskog\u2019s long-awaited return against Dallas opposite Valeri Nichushkin on the Nelson line gave Colorado a hulking, dangerous unit. Before a down season last year (26 G), Nelson averaged 34 goals per 82 games from 2019-24, a level the 34-year-old vet hopes to rediscover in Colorado\u2019s high-octane attack. Nichushkin, meanwhile, is invaluable when he\u2019s available, a hybrid of tireless forechecker and netfront beast. Colorado has played at a nearly 57-win pace since 2021 when the Russian dresses. He just needs to stay in the lineup; injuries and suspensions have kept \u2018Nuke\u2019 to fewer than 66 games in all six of his seasons as an Av.<\/p>\n Further down the lineup, winger Victor Olofsson could prove a smart late-summer signing. Streaky power forward Ross Colton (16 G in 61 GP) was the Avalanche\u2019s only proven bottom-six scorer before Olofsson joined up, a scary proposition given what we know about Lehkonen and Nichushkin\u2019s injury history (and what we don\u2019t know about Landeskog\u2019s reconstructed knee). Though Olofsson has never topped his promising rookie season (20 G in 54 GP), the Swede is still a talented shooter who could help out the Avalanche\u2019s seldom-used second power play.<\/p>\n Then there\u2019s the blueline, which happens to include the most captivating defenseman to hit the NHL since Bobby Orr debuted nearly 60 years ago. Cale Makar just posted the second 30-goal season by a D-man since 1993, and his dazzling end-to-end charges make it almost disappointing that his career-high is \u201conly\u201d 92 points. Triple digits should be attainable this season.<\/p>\n DEFENSE<\/p>\n Has Makar\u2019s legendary offensive prowess made him an underrated defender? Jared Bednar likes to use Makar, partner Devon Toews, and the MacKinnon line as a five-man unit to force the opposition\u2019s best players onto the back foot. For Makar, that meant the 12th-most minutes against \u201celite\u201d competition of any defenseman in 2024-25, per Puck IQ. He still finished with the best scoring-chance share (58.9%) and second-most takeaways (60) at his position as he claimed his second Norris Trophy.\u00a0<\/p>\n Toews, in the tradition of Brian Rafalski and the late great Brad McCrimmon, is severely overlooked due to his association with a superstar partner. The former Islander<\/a> averages a +41 rating and over 49 takeaways per 82 games for the Avs. It doesn\u2019t hurt that he\u2019s also good for 10 goals and 50 points a season. An expert at using speed and timing to smother plays, Toews will partner Makar for Team Canada in Milan.\u00a0<\/p>\n Playing the best pair in hockey for half the game lifts all boats in Colorado. Still, the diminutive duo of Samuel Girard and Sam Malinski deserves credit for keeping a patchwork bottom four afloat last season. Girard\u2019s offensive production has cratered in recent years (24 P in 73 GP), but he\u2019s a smart defender with the speed and skill to keep the Avs moving in the right direction. It\u2019s a low-event style that Cornell grad Malinski was smart to mime in his first full season.<\/p>\n Josh Manson\u2019s injury record (48 GP in 2024-25) and tendency to take bad penalties can make him a frustrating player, but a top-four spot beside Girard will still be waiting for him when camp breaks. The 33-year-old is unique in his ability to clear the crease while still keeping up with the pace Bednar demands (69th percentile in top speed by a D, per NHL EDGE). Manson\u2019s new understudy, 40-year-old Brent Burns, will have to settle for bottom-pair minutes after a rough final season in Carolina.<\/p>\n Joel Kiviranta and Parker Kelly\u2019s dogged work ethic on Colorado\u2019s checking line made them fan favorites last season. Unfortunately, they could be without their usual left winger, defensive maven Logan O\u2019Connor, until Christmas as he recovers from offseason hip surgery. Lehkonen, Nichushkin, and Kiviranta are all options to take over O\u2019Connor\u2019s minutes on the Avs\u2019 penalty kill, which finished 12th last year.<\/p>\n GOALTENDING<\/p>\n Colorado\u2019s 17th-ranked team SV% might fall right into the meaty part of the curve, but the overall number includes two months of Georgiev playing himself out of the NHL. From the time of Blackwood\u2019s debut on Dec. 14, the Avalanche\u2019s .907 mark was the fifth-best in the league. The only clubs ahead of Colorado over that span (WPG<\/a>, TBL<\/a>, LAK<\/a>, DAL) boasted the top-four finishers in the end-of-year All-Star vote in order.<\/p>\n Blackwood\u2019s reputation and confidence suffered behind skeleton crews in San Jose and New Jersey, but the big shotstopper looks like a new man in Denver. A 6\u20194\u2033 netminder with elite post-to-post athleticism, Blackwood is never really out of a play until the puck hits twine. If he can bounce back from a disappointing postseason to prove 2024-25 was his new normal, a Team Canada bid is not out of the question. MacFarland was shrewd to lock up the 28-year-old for five years before the Canucks inflated the goalie market.<\/p>\n Scott Wedgewood actually arrived two weeks earlier than his old Devils<\/a> teammate Blackwood, and was pretty much perfect in spot duty, enjoying the best stretch of his career (13-4-1, 1.99 GAA, .917 SV% for COL). Wedgewood will still be a reliable veteran hand even if he regresses to his previous career averages (2.98 GAA, .906 SV%).<\/p>\n COACHING<\/p>\n In the cutthroat world of hockey coaching, Bednar\u2019s eight-season run at the helm of the Avalanche is now officially more prestigious than his Stanley Cup ring. Bednar surely treasures his ring over his job security, but Mike Sullivan\u2019s amicable divorce with Pittsburgh made Bednar the second-longest tenured bench boss in the show by some ways behind only Tampa Bay\u2019s Jon Cooper. Paul Maurice\u2019s championship double, meanwhile, means there are three coaches, including Bednar and Cooper, who have won the ultimate prize in their current posts.<\/p>\n Bednar hasn\u2019t stuck around this long by coasting off 2022, though. It takes an elite motivator to implement a system with such rigorous physical demands, even with superstar workaholic MacKinnon around to help keep the troops in line. No club skates harder, and since MacKinnon\u2019s first big year, the results have been there to match: Bednar\u2019s Avs have collected regular-season wins at a nearly 105-point pace, enough to fight for the division crown more often than not. The great irony of Bednar\u2019s glowing resume, which makes him a likely Hall-of-Famer at the spritely age of 52? He\u2019s almost certainly toast if Colorado suffers another first-round exit, fluky or not. Such is life in the NHL.<\/p>\n The help looks a little different this year, with former Jack Adams finalist Dave Hakstol on the bench in place of Ray Bennett, who got the axe after the Avalanche\u2019s usually potent power play went just 3-22 against Dallas. Hakstol ousted the Avs from the playoffs in 2023 as Seattle<\/a>\u2019s head coach and led the collegiate North Dakota Fighting Hawks, archrivals of the Denver Pioneers, for 11 seasons.\u00a0No hard feelings, right?<\/p>\n ROOKIES<\/p>\n Woof. The NHL\u2019s true blue bloods often swap long-term reinforcements for short-term help, and that\u2019s certainly true of Colorado, owners of the league\u2019s fourth-worst pipeline<\/a> per Daily Faceoff prospect guru Steven Ellis.<\/p>\n
Brent Burns, D
Gavin Brindley, C
Danil Gushchin, LW<\/p>\n
Charlie Coyle, C (CBJ)
Ryan Lindgren, D (Sea)
Erik Johnson, D (UFA)
Miles Wood, LW (CBJ)
Chris Wagner, C (AHL)
Jimmy Vesey, RW (Swi.)
Jere Innala, LW (SHL)<\/p>\n