The Colorado Avalanche acquired Zachary L’Heureux from the Nashville Predators earlier in the offseason. It was a move that happened because the team wasn’t confident that they could re-sign Jack Drury, who was a piece that was also included in the trade. L’Heureux hasn’t lived up the expectations that come with being a first-round draft pick. He has nine goals and 11 assists in 87 games over two seasons.
L’Heureux figures to play a bottom-six role for the Avalanche. Despite that former first-round draft pick status, a team doesn’t always need those players to play top-six minutes. The Avalanche’s top-six is loaded enough and Colorado was just trying to get some depth for the 2026-27 season.
It didn’t work out for L’Heureux in Nashville despite getting some top-line minutes in 2025-26. In 87 career games, he has averaged 10:58 of ice time per game with the Predators. That would be very close to the bottom of the Avalanche in terms of skaters, especially the regulars. For example, Ross Colton averaged 12:31 of ice time in 73 games.
Per DailyFaceoff, L’Heureux is listed as the Avalanche’s fourth-line right wing wit O’Connor centering the line and Parker Kelly taking care of the left side. Those are two veteran players that can help L’Heureux if/when it is needed.
Though it is disappointing for L’Heureux that he is that far down on the depth chart, all any player really needs is to receive a single opportunity. The Avalanche are historically a winning team. That alone should take a lot of pressure off of the new guy going forward because he’s not coming in to be the star of the show.
L’Heureux is a big, physical forward who likely won’t generate a ton of scoring for the Avalanche. That’s okay, because sometimes being physical will do a team a lot of good. You can’t ask a player to do more than what he is capable of and ask less of him with the stuff that he is good at. That just doesn’t make sense and is why some players have failed.
There is a chance of a golden opportunity for L’Heureux with the Avalanche though. If injuries start to happen higher up in the lineup, the team could lean on L’Heureux to step up his game, not only in the physicality aspect, but everything else, like great passing and opportunistic scoring.
It really would be the best thing for the Avalanche to not have to rely on him as heavily, though. If they get to that point during the season, it means that injuries have taken over and the team is in trouble. If we could see 8-10 goals from him during the 2026-27 season, that would be more than enough. It would be a career-high for him.
We’ve seen the Avalanche be able to get the most out of players in the past. The most notable player as of late is Parker Kelly. Kelly never reached 10 goals in a season in five previous years before 2025-26. His career-high before last year was eight, which he accomplished twice. Kelly hit the 21-goal mark last year in what was easily the team’s biggest breakout.
I don’t expect L’Heureux to have the same success, but if he does, that would be pretty cool.
Add us as a preferred source on Google