This is the 2025-26 edition — an archived read. Read the 2026-27 report →
Valeri Nichushkin
Colorado Avalanche Right Wing
21 goals in 43 games, which is the best rate on the club and, again, less than half a season of them.
| Season | Team | GP | G | A | PTS | +/- | PIM | PP | SH | GW | S | S% | TOI |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 2013-14 | DAL | 79 | 14 | 20 | 34 | +20 | 8 | 2 | 0 | 2 | 128 | 10.9 | 14:58 |
| 2014-15 | DAL | 8 | 0 | 1 | 1 | -5 | 2 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 6 | 0.0 | 13:46 |
| 2015-16 | DAL | 79 | 9 | 20 | 29 | +2 | 12 | 1 | 0 | 1 | 139 | 6.5 | 13:56 |
| 2018-19 | DAL | 57 | 0 | 10 | 10 | -4 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 65 | 0.0 | 11:55 |
| 2019-20 | COL | 65 | 13 | 14 | 27 | +26 | 14 | 1 | 1 | 3 | 113 | 11.5 | 14:04 |
| 2020-21 | COL | 55 | 10 | 11 | 21 | +9 | 4 | 0 | 1 | 4 | 98 | 10.2 | 14:05 |
| 2021-22 | COL | 62 | 25 | 27 | 52 | +21 | 14 | 5 | 2 | 5 | 180 | 13.9 | 19:02 |
| 2022-23 | COL | 53 | 17 | 30 | 47 | +15 | 2 | 10 | 1 | 2 | 158 | 10.8 | 20:16 |
| 2023-24 | COL | 54 | 28 | 25 | 53 | +5 | 22 | 16 | 0 | 6 | 158 | 17.7 | 21:21 |
| 2024-25 | COL | 43 | 21 | 13 | 34 | +11 | 8 | 5 | 0 | 0 | 118 | 17.8 | 19:44 |
| 2025-26 so far | — | — | — | — | — | — | — | — | — | — | — | — | — |
| Career | — | 555 | 137 | 171 | 308 | +100 | 86 | 40 | 5 | 23 | 1163 | 11.8 | 16:15 |
This Season So Far
The 2025-26 season has not started. The empty row above is his, and both it and this paragraph fill in on their own from the morning after he first plays: what he has done, what it is worth against his own last season, and the run he is on when the two disagree.
Last Season
21 goals and 13 assists in 43 games for 34 points, plus-11, on 19:44 a night. Scaled over 82 that is a 40-goal season, and he has not played 82 games since 2021-22.
51.3 per cent at five-on-five, the 64th percentile, which is the lowest figure among the club’s top-six forwards and the one number here that is genuinely ordinary. 17.8 per cent shooting from a median of 23 feet.
The Finesse Game
A 6-4 winger who plays like a power forward and finishes like a sniper, which is an unusual pair of things to be. He takes the puck to the net rather than around it, protects it with his back to pressure better than anyone on the roster, and has a heavy release he gets away in traffic.
What he is not is a creator. 13 assists in 43 games is a man who finishes plays rather than starting them, and the passing has never been the strong half of his game. Put him beside a centre who can find him and he scores; put him on a third line and he becomes a very good defensive winger.
The Physical Game
6-4 and 210, and among the more genuinely difficult forwards in the league to play against. He wins the wall, he goes to the front of the net, and he is strong enough to hold a position there against defencemen who would move most wingers.
8 penalty minutes in 43 games is remarkable for a man who plays this heavily — he is physical without being reckless, which is the version of it that stays on the ice.
The Intangibles
The reason this is a difficult report to write is that none of the hockey is the issue. He has been away from the club twice under the player assistance programme, most recently in 2024, and returned from the second absence in November.
That is a health matter and not a character one, and it should be read as such. What it means for a projection is unavoidable: the club cannot plan on him for 82 games, has not been able to for three years, and the last time it built a playoff line around the assumption it did not have him. 21 goals in 43 games is what he is worth when he is there.
The numbers underneath
On the ice
Five-on-five, 2024-25 · 577 minutes
- Expected goals
- 51.3%
- 65th pct
- Shot attempts
- 54.7%
- 91st pct
share of the chances while he was out there
share of the attempts while he was out there
Goals while he was on the ice: 30 for, 17 against. Expected: 26.2 and 24.9.
The eye and the numbers
HindsightThe report ranks him 27 points above where the numbers do. It was written for a back edition, with the seasons that followed already known. Neither the agreement nor the gap says anything about the eye, and this report is excluded from the club-level comparison for the same reason. Why the numbers land there sets out the club he did it on, the minutes he played and the men he played them with.
Both bars are percentiles among the 237 skaters in this edition with a report and enough ice time. The report bar ranks the mean of the grades above — 82 on their own scale — against every other report's mean. The numbers bar ranks his share of expected goals. A gap is a disagreement about where he belongs, not two scales talking past each other.
Usual linemates
2024-25 · 577 minutes at five-on-five
- Jonathan Drouinnow NYI29%
Share of his five-on-five ice time spent alongside each player, measured from shift charts. Special teams are excluded: a power-play unit is not a line.
Why the numbers land there
Five-on-five, 2024-25
- The club
- COL took 53.2% of the expected goals as a club. His own share is 51.3% — 1.9 below the club he did it on.
- The role
- Third line, 577 minutes at five-on-five — 21st percentile in ice time.
With and without
| Teammate | Together | Him apart | Mate apart |
|---|---|---|---|
| Nathan MacKinnon | 56.5% | 46.2% | 58.8% |
| Cale Makar | 54.0% | 49.2% | 57.3% |
| Devon Toews | 52.3% | 50.7% | 55.9% |
56.5% together, 46.2% for him apart and 58.8% for MacKinnon apart. He was worse away from MacKinnon, who was no better away from him — he needed that pairing more than MacKinnon did.
Expected-goal share while both were on the ice, and for each man in the minutes he played without the other. Apart is the pair subtracted from his own totals. It does not settle who was carrying whom — apart from each other, both were still playing with somebody — but it does say whether the share travelled when the pairing broke up.
Where he shoots from
goal on goal missed
172 unblocked shots in 2024-25, 21 of them goals. His median goal came from 19 feet. 44% of his shots came from inside twenty feet, 16% from beyond forty.