Avalanche’s Brock Nelson plays in 1,000th career NHL game
Brock Nelson hit a significant milestone on Monday night, as the Colorado Avalanche center skated in his 1,000th NHL game.
Our gold medalist. Our general. Our Brock Star. Congratulations to Brock Nelson on 1,000 career games 👏
The Avalanche were playing on the road on Monday night, as they were visiting the Edmonton Oilers, so there wasn’t a pregame ceremony to celebrate Nelson’s milestone. However, after another game on Tuesday against the Calgary Flames, the Avs do have one more home game on Thursday against the Seattle Kraken, so Nelson’s achievement may be honoured then.
Nelson’s 1,000 games comes after 14 seasons in the NHL with the New York Islanders and the Avalanche, 901 with New York and 99 with Colorado. He enters his 1,000 game with 334 goals and 318 assists for 652 points in 999 games, along with 27 goals and 27 assists for 54 points in 85 playoff games. While he didn’t achieve the mark with only one franchise, his 901 games with the Isles ranks sixth in franchise history.
A first-round pick for the Islanders in the 2010 draft with their 30th-overall pick, Nelson spent two years in the Western Collegiate Hockey Association with the University of North Dakota and then spent two seasons in the AHL with the Bridgeport Sound Tigers before making his NHL debut in Game 6 of the 2013 Stanley Cup Playoffs against the Pittsburgh Penguins. He then became an NHL regular the following season and never looked back, playing parts of 13 seasons on Long Island.
However, last season saw the Islanders poised to begin a rebuild, and with Nelson in the final year of a contract, he was dealt to the Avalanche at the 2025 trade deadline. After a solid stint with the Avs that year, he re-signed with the team to his current three-year deal with a $7.5 million cap hit.
While Nelson hasn’t won anything of note at the NHL level, he did capture Olympic gold with the United States in the 2026 Winter Olympics in Italy, where he had two goals and one assist for three points in six games.
Nelson entered Monday night’s game with 33 goals and 32 assists for 65 points in 79 games on the season.