Transcript of Colorado Avalanche 2024-25 NHL Season Preview | The Steve Dangle Podcast

The Colorado Avalanche. Notable fans, producer Drew. And listen, they've gone through a couple of changes in the last few years. And since their Stanley Cup victory in 2022, they've had moments where you thought, Oh, they're for sure doing it. But last year, they didn't have beyond that first line, the oomph that I think you needed, that losing Caudry really did affect them.

But there's certain teams that the rules just don't apply to.

And it's the Colorado Abil. Yeah.

You can't just rely on one D pair. You can't just rely on one line. Well, you can if they're good.

If you're Kael Mekar and Nathan McCart.

What did you say? They didn't have enough in the forward group?

Well, Before even chutzpa.

They led the league in goals.

I know. But Nathan McKinnon, Miko Rantan, and Jonathan drew in.

That's why he went. They led the league in goals.

Let's look at the who scored the pointsometer. Mekinen? Who cares? Yeah. Well, yeah.

At the end of the day, who cares? Mckinnon, Nate.

Rantinen, Miko.

140 points. Rantanin with 104, Mekar with 90, and Druan with 56.

Good Lord.

That's crazy.

Druan was great for them. One of their weaknesses, I look at their left side, Drewam, Miles Wood, Joel, Kiviranta, and Parker Kelly. You could do better than that. You don't love that? I don't love that. Right side, I think there's two players here that are going to make a big, big difference for them or could make a big, big difference for them. Nikolai Kovalenko, Daily Face-off, has them slotting in to the top six. He's a rookie for them. Colorado needs a rookie to come in. There's two huge... Well, I'll get to them. I'll do the other guy first. Casey Middlestat is a massive, massive upgrade on Ryan Johansson, and he's the best second-line center they've had since Kadri. People forget that that was a mid-season trade. To have a full season of him behind Nathan crew is going to be massive for this team. Now, there's two monkey wrenches in this whole equation. Gabriel Landeskog, we still don't know what the hell is going on there.

So updates on Landeskog. Jared Bednar told NHL. Com in August, he's trying to make a return here sometime near the start of the season. And if that goes well, it could be a really big boost for us, Bednar said, according to NHL. Com. So that's something we're all a little anxious about, but really excited about as well. He hasn't played for us in two years. That's the latest on Landee.

We don't know if he's coming back. It sounds like he's coming back. When he does come back, how is he going to do? Another huge guy, Valeriy Natchushkin.

Yeah, Valeriy Natchushkin. Update. Here you go. He's eligible to return to the lineup, to the team on November 13th. That means he'll miss at least the first 16 games of the season. That's when the suspension would be the automatic suspension that happened because of his transgressions in the player assistance program that happened last season. So the team also said they asked them at training camp if they would welcome him back, and they said, yeah, everything water under the bridge.

If he comes back and he wants to play and to be a member of this team and help us win, we will welcome him back.

And that takes a juiced forward group.

Yeah, makes them juiced. Yeah. So there's two possible additions.

But then with him, again, okay, you get him back. Are you getting them back at 100 %? He's missed the first 16 games of the season. So it's funny. They scored the most goals in the NHL. So if they just continued on this road, they'll be fine. And to that, they might add Landiscag and Natchujkind.

Right. Yes. Terrifying. Not bad. On the back-end, you've got a really amazing top four. Thays, Mccar, Gerard, Manson, but also a couple of guys that are younger and great, or at least great potential. Eric Brandstrom from the Ottawa Senator's first round pick of the Vegas Goldenites and Oliver Shillington, formerly of the Calgary Flames. I think we all know what Taz, Mccar, Gerard, and Manson are. Let's talk about Brandstrom and Shillington as the potential bottom two defensemen on this team? What do you like? What do you not like? What do you need to see?

Well, Colorado plans on having the pucks, so that's a good thing.

Yeah, they can do that.

But you talk about two guys with enormous potential who just have the cushiest damn job. Here's what Colorado needs.

You can't not shelter them with that type of top four. You can't not shelter them. They will be sheltered, and that's good.

I don't think this is the way Colorado thinks. But if you wanted to give Makar and Nate and everyone a break, Makar and Taves, I should say, you could do worse than those two. You really could. There's a lot of teams where you look at a certain pair they have or their third pair, and if the oilers' top line gets a hold of them, they're dead. I don't look at the avalanche and think that.

Jesse?

It brands him such an interesting case for the Colorado avalanche because the Ottawa senators made a curious decision the day before free agency to not qualify him. That he spoke to Denver Media at the beginning of training camp, and he said, This whole thing happened very fast. It was the day before free agency. They decided not to kill me. Colorado reached out very quickly on July first with this contract, and they got him for 900 grand. It's unreal.

It's an unreal steal because here's a player who can be an offensive force on the back end, like all of the other Avalanche defensemen have been over the years, Kael McCart in particular, when Bo Byron was there and all that fun stuff.

So you have another just guy who's going to put up points from the back-end. So this forward group that we're talking about, Hey, they are the best forward group last season in terms of scoring goals. They're now going to be supported even more in the depth of their D from an offensive standpoint. It's fantastic signing.

And it's not like your brand, stream, and his agent and you look at the avalanche and you're like, I'm going to be on the top power play. No, you know. You might not even be on the second.

Bednar got this kid to play in a specific role, and they know we have guys up front, and you're not going to break that unless you turn otherworldly and you can sit here and just make your money and be happy.

It seems to, too, that Brandstroms needed a change of scenery for about two or three years. Remember, this is one of the centerpieces of the Mark Stone trade. What was interesting in Ottawa was that he He seemed to fall out of favor with DJ Smith. Clearly, they wanted a change, but Ottawa wouldn't give him up because they valued what he had. This guy is a talented hockey player. I have to be honest, the Ottawa coaching situation over the last five years, no disrespect to DJ Smith and his staff. But if we're going to call a spade a spade, it wasn't great. I think when you go to a team like the Colorado Avalanche, when you have Kael Mccar to look up to, you're still in your early 20s. And Tays. And Tays, and Nathan McKinnon, and a group that has a good chunk of these core players have won a Stanley Cup together. This is such a great situation for a guy like him, and Chillington as well.

Well, and again, this often comes up. We usually talk about the 2018 and 2019 draughts. You could add 2017 into that. Just so many guys had their development screwed up. He played for two AHL teams and two games in the NHL in the '18, '19 season. He played 27 games with the Belleville senators and then 31 games with the Ottawa senators before the world stopped. He played a wonky-ass season with the Langnau Tigers. I've never heard of them, but they're in the Swiss League. And he only played 10 games before joining the Ottawa senators and playing 30 games. And then he was with Belleville for a little bit of that. He had five assists in four games. And then he He finally shows up in Ottawa, has a consistent spot, and him and the coach don't really gel. And all of a sudden, this offensive dynamo from the back-end that you were expecting has been stunted a little bit in his development.

I wouldn't be surprised if being an undersized defenseman scared some teams. But in Colorado, that won't scare them at all. I think Bednar looks at that and like, I don't know. We got a guy who can do things from the back end. I don't care that he's five 5, 10, 185 and isn't hulking back there. We're going to use him the way he should be deployed. It's going to be fascinating to watch. And Shilling thing, too. We spent so much time on Branstein, but Shilling thing, too. Just great underrated signing.

There's a lot of potential there. If you're Colorado, you got to have confidence in your ability to take players with great natural talent and create a little comeback tour for them. Jonathan Druin. Oh, yeah. It was incredible for them last year, and they're keeping them, and why wouldn't they?

This is what you do as a cap team. When you have players who are making a whole bunch of money and you want to just get better on the edges, you develop these guys who are like reclamation projects. Colorado has been fantastic.

Guess who made the recommendation to sign it? It was Nathan McKinnon. He said, You have to sign this guy. Please put him on my wing. And they were magic again. One quick thing. I want to look at goal tending for just a second, guys. Georgiev and looks like Justus Annenen will be the starter and the backup.

Ivan Prasvetov. Prasvetov?

I think. Will probably draw into a couple of games as well. But Georgiev obviously didn't have the- Did he sign in the KHA?

I thought he signed in the KHA. Oh, did he?

Okay, well, regardless. Okay, maybe he's not there. Annenen was a guy that I think a lot of Aves fans were looking like, are they going to replace this guy? Are they going to put somebody ahead of him? They seem to be completely fine with keeping him where he is. And he had a 928 save percentage when he played last year.

In 14 games, and he was good in the A2.

Georgiev has had health issues, didn't have the best year last year.

Well, he didn't have winning game issues.

No, he won a lot of games.

He won a lot of games. I always love to bring up Ustis Annenin because he gets lost But I did the trade tree for it. The Avalanche got that pick for Annenin through the Matt Dushane trade. I don't think it was directly, but it was on the way down. I think this guy take over for Georgiev as soon as this season. That's aggressive. It's aggressive. I think some things would need to go wrong for Georgiev and right for Anunin, but that's how good I think this kid could be.

Okay, so the points for Are they Colorado Avalanche, gentlemen. Last year, obviously, they had a spectacular run. They finished third in the division with 107 points, which, by the way, would- A 107 third? Wow. And In most divisions, they still would have actually been third. When I look at it, there was a lot of feast or famine in the NHL last year. Remember, a lot of teams were tanking, right? So a lot of teams on the high end were scoring a ton of wins. Celebriney factor. Yeah. So this year, odds makers have them taken a bit of a step back. It's 102 and a half. I think that's an over, right?

I'm going to take the over. I'm going to take the over. I'm going to say they're first place. Also, Ivan Prospectov is playing for CSK a Moscow.

There you go. There was a clip a couple of days ago of him trying to fight a guy.

I thought I saw that.

That's why I was like, Wait, didn't I? A few days ago from when we were recording this, he tried to fight somebody in one of the early season DHL games because the player came over and pushed him in the net, and he came over and challenged him. So yeah, process of making waves in the DHL. Good for him. Steve, I said first place and over.

First place, and I punched the over like an insult of Felix Podfen. Wow.

Yeah. Holy cow. I have them in first place as well. I think they're a spectacular team. This is the best Avs team since they won the Cup.

No, whenever we agree, it never happened.

No, it's happening this time. Same in second place, Atlanta. Damn it.

Who do they pick with their lottery pick?