Colorado might make a draft selection in LA this weekend.
It certainly won’t be like last year.
The upcoming 2025 NHL draft won’t compare to the spectacular experience The Sphere provided in Las Vegas and the Colorado Avalanche won’t approach the same universe of a nine-pick draft class they amassed in 2024. Instead, the NHL is trying out a forecasted underwhelming “decentralized” draft and currently the Avalanche have just two draft selections starting in the fourth round.
We know Colorado has been handing out draft picks like Halloween candy for years but it’s often lost how far the ledger goes back. Colorado’s own second rounder was spent on Lars Eller in 2023, their first rounder went to get rid of Ryan Johansen in 2024 and Yakov Trenin was rented for their third rounder the same year. This year’s bill for the shopping spree including Brock Nelson and Jusso Parssinen won’t come due until 2026 and 2027 respectively.
Targets at 114th Overall
Assuming no additional picks are acquired, the Avalanche will join the draft in the fourth round. Perhaps this is the best year to have the organization enjoy the festivities from a remote location. It’s impossible to forecast a specific player that could be a good fit and might be available that deep into the draft.
The last fourth round selection the Avalanche made was at 121st overall in 2024 on center Jake Fisher who ended up scoring 15 points as a freshman as a Denver Pioneer. Prior to that, NCAA forward Colby Ambrosio was selected at 118th overall in 2020 but Colorado has just let his rights lapse. So, if history repeats maybe another collegiate forward is on the radar as the organization loves the longer timeline to make a decision on those players.
Every position is of need for the Avalanche at this point, so rather than pitch a certain position I’m going to once again beg to target the most skilled player in the draft left at that selection. It’s going to take a miracle to get this pick into the Avalanche lineup so bet on talent. Grinders and depth players come from other organizations so don’t talk yourselves into getting a good bottom six penalty killer with this pick.
Targets at 218th Overall
It might be a surprise to say the Avalanche have an affinity for seventh rounders as they have made a draft selection in the seventh round every year since 1998 with the exception of in 2020. Colorado would be thrilled to find someone to follow in center Nikita Prishchepov’s footsteps who went from 217th overall pick in 2024 to an Entry Level Contract, a regular spot the lineup in the AHL and an astounding 10-game NHL debut all in the same calendar year. The talented Russian still has a long way to a NHL graduation but he’s already the most successful pick the organization has made in the last four years.
Prishchepov was drafted from Victoriaville in the QMJHL, who is another player in a very surprising line of ELC signed seventh round picks selected from the Canadian Hockey League. Until the organization passed on signing goaltender Ivan Zhigalov from their two-pick 2022 draft class, they had signed every CHL seventh rounder in their history stretching back to forwards Radim Vrbata in 1999 and Marek Svatos from the 2001 draft class. This list also includes Trent Miner, Travis Barron, Julien Nantel, Colin Smith and Kyle Cumiskey. Not a lot of NHL success since the latter was drafted in 2005 but to even find NHL contracted contributors 200-plus picks deep in the draft is a measure of success.
Needless to say. the Avalanche probably should choose a CHL player with their seventh round pick. There’s always a few players who fall through the cracks from the large CHL talent pool who were pegged as potential mid-round selections. This is counter-intuitive to Colorado’s affinity for long-range NCAA and KHL picks but there seems to be a method of success in identifying these players at the tail end of the draft.
Who would you like to see Colorado draft, let us know in the comments!