The Colorado Avalanche, as of Friday morning—the day of the 2026 NHL Draft’s first round—made some noise on Thursday when they traded Valeri Nichushkin to the Columbus Blue Jackets for three draft picks. They added a second-rounder for this year, along with a third-round pick in 2027 and a fifth-round pick in 2028.
For this weekend’s draft, the Avs hold a whopping ten selections. There is still more time to pass, too. We could enter the minutes up to the first round and something crazier might happen.
The Avs have been called out numerous times about their poor prospect pool. They’ve got a couple of recent picks still trying to make a name for themselves in college/university level hockey before taking that next step.
After trading Calum Ritchie, the pool got a lot less full.
Trent Miner and Ilya Nabokov are the 1-2 punch in goal for the Colorado Eagles. The Avs also drafted two other goaltenders in the 2024 Draft alongside Nabokov, in Louka Cloutier and Ivan Yunin. They took swings, and hopefully they pan out.
Gavin Brindley is perhaps the biggest name when it comes to the Avalanche’s AHL forwards. He spent this past season playing 56 games for the Avalanche, recording six goals and seven assists. He also had two goals and four assists in nine games for the Eagles this past year.
Defenseman Mikhail Gulyayev is a former first-round pick of the Avalanche (31st overall in 2023). He has spent the last four years with Avangard Omsk in the KHL, totalling 12 goals and 18 assists in 185 games.
While I listed a couple of players who are either still developing in the college ranks or spending the majority of their time in the AHL, the fact is that that number of prospects just isn’t enough. At some point, the Avalanche will have to draft and keep those players around to eventually come up to the the NHL level.
Signing free agents and trading for players is fun and all, but the Avalanche have got to start being mindful of developing players who can potentially earn a second contract with them instead of playing the salary cap game.
Sure, I understand the window of opportunity. However, look at where their actions got the Avalanche lately. Nichushkin is gone because they needed some cap space to fill out their roster. If they had the right players developed, they maybe could have just called them up instead. It would have been much cheaper, plus they maybe could have kept their second-line winger.
This draft is going to be crucial for the development of the Avalanche. They’ve got the picks—they just have to utilize them the right way.
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