The Colorado Avalanche just completed going from worst to first and winning the Stanley Cup in a mere five seasons. While it has been an incredible turnaround filled with smart signings, trades and savvy extensions to their top draft picks, the rebuild did not start five years ago.
It’s always difficult to pinpoint when exactly a rebuild is starting because so many teams are loath to admit it, but in the nine seasons between 2008 and 2017, the Avalanche made the playoffs twice.
In that time, they drafted Matt Duchene third overall (2009), Gabriel Landeskog second (2011), Nathan MacKinnon first (2013), Mikko Rantanen 10th (2015) and depending on how you want to count it, Cale Makar fourth (2017).