2016 Top 25 Avalanche under 25: #7 Tyson Jost

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The BSN Denver 2016 top 25 Colorado Avalanche under 25 series continues today with number 7 on our list, center Tyson Jost. One of the newest members of the Avalanche prospect pool, Tyson Jost was drafted 10th overall in the 2016 NHL Entry Draft and will begin his NCAA career this season with the University of North Dakota.

As we get closer to the top of our list, the BSN staff inches closer and closer to consensus rankings for the team’s top prospects. Among the seven ballots, Jost held an average rank of 6.7 with multiple ballots awarding him a high rank of 5th overall and one ballot ranking him 8th at his lowest.

Who is Tyson Jost?

Tyson Jost has been a major subject of interest around BSN Denver for a good part of the summer already. We profiled the BCHL’s top player before the draft, after the Avalanche selected him 10th overall, and tracked his performance at development camp this summer.

In his draft year, Tyson Jost torched the BCHL for42 goals and 104 points in just 48 games played, all while displaying defensive talent and an off-the-charts hockey IQ that made many scouts clamor for him as a Top 10 talent in the draft. While Jost’s numbers in the BCHL are mind-bogglingly impressive, the BCHL is generally considered a second tier development league when it comes to NHL prospects, and the quality of competition is certainly lower than that of the CHL or USHL. Jost showed scouts, however, that he was no fluke by taking his show on the road and breaking Conner McDavid’s all-time scoring record for team Canada at the U-18 World Championships.

What is the future for Tyson Jost?

The immediate future for Tyson Jost is easy to predict. Thanks to NCAA regulations surrounding compensation, he will not attend Avalanche training camp, but instead begin his NCAA career with the defending NCAA Champion North Dakota Fighting Hawks. UND figures to be extremely competitive again this season and Jost should slot almost immediately into the team’s top line alongside Vancouver prospect Brock Boeser.

Where Jost goes from there is more of a mystery. Should the two-way center handle the increased physicality of the NCAA well and produce anything like Kyle Connor did last season in Michigan, then it’s likely that he leaves the NCAA after just one season and signs a professional contract with the Avalanche next summer. It seems highly unlikely given Jost’s impressive pedigree that he would spend more than two years in college before joining the ranks of professional hockey.

On a team that will still employ Nathan MacKinnon, Matt Duchene, and Carl Soderberg for at least the next three years it might seem that Tyson Jost doesn’t have a natural fit, but given Duchene’s success on the wing and Jost’s defensive acumen it’s easy to imagine all four in the lineup moving forward. Should Jost reach his full potential, he would give the Avalanche a very different look at center and the best two-way player at the position since the team traded Ryan O’Reilly in 2015.