Where should the Avalanche look to upgrade at the trade deadline?

The Colorado Avalanche have been the clear top team in the NHL this season, as it took until December 4 for the Avs to suffer their second regulation loss of the season.

With a 21-2-6 mark, Colorado is three points clear of the Dallas Stars for second in both the Central Division and NHL standings, and the next-closest team sits nine points behind the Avalanche.

Colorado is scoring more goals per game than any other team, allowing fewer than anyone else, and getting the best save percentage in the NHL.

Teams in this position are inevitably buyers at the trade deadline, but given the way the team is currently playing, it’s almost hard to imagine a realistic way to meaningfully improve the roster as it stands currently.

On Monday’s episode of Daily Faceoff LIVE, host Tyler Yaremchuk and co-host and former NHL goaltender Carter Hutton were joined by Jesse Montano of Guerilla Sports to discuss the possible areas the Avs could look at to bolster at the deadline for the playoff run.

Carter Hutton: It’s never too early to talk trades, to talk depth. Where does this team go from here? Because they’re going to be in a very good situation. They’re building up a nice base, but when the trade deadline comes, it’s going to be after the Olympic break, where do they start to add in pieces to really make this team a Cup contender to try to win it this year?

Jesse Montano: It’s a good question because when you’re rolling like this, you sit there and you kind of balance like how much do you want to shake things up? How much do you just want to stick with this group that’s rolling? I really see two areas for this group right now that I say yeah, you probably want to add there before the deadline comes and goes. The big one your third-line center. Jack Drury has performed there totally admirably. No real complaints, but I think having seen a team that went four rounds, won a Stanley Cup just a few years ago. Their third and fourth line did a lot of heavy lifting for them in some of those playoff games, so I think you’d want Jack Drury to slide back down to that fourth line, and you’d want an upgrade there at 3C. And then truthfully, I think you’d want a seventh D.

You can watch the full segment and the rest of the episode here…