This story was originally published on Hockey Mountain High, part of the Mile High Sports network.
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The Colorado Avalanche moved up in the 2026 NHL Draft to get Cole Tuminaro at 140th overall and kept their 152nd overall pick to get Theodore Lechner. With the move up, Colorado lost its 149th pick and one of its seventh-round picks to the New Jersey Devils.
🚨Trade
To #NJDevils
’26 5th #149 (orig PHI)
’26 7th #222#GoAvsGo
’26 4th #140This is an even trade on the PuckPedia Perri Pick Value Calculatorhttps://t.co/yL3wuWNBq3
— PuckPedia (@PuckPedia) June 27, 2026
We have drafted defenseman Cole Tuminaro to the Colorado Avalanche organization! pic.twitter.com/1lMDJI7BFk
— Colorado Avalanche (@Avalanche) June 27, 2026
We have drafted defenseman Theodore Lechner to the Colorado Avalanche organization! pic.twitter.com/Nxnuk5VdVQ
— Colorado Avalanche (@Avalanche) June 27, 2026
Cole Tuminaro
Tuminaro was coveted enough for Joe Sakic to make a deal and move up in the draft. He’s a big right-shot defenseman standing at 6-foot-4.
Tuminaro played last season in the USHL with the Chicago Steel in 54 games. He put up five goals and had 11 assists in the campaign.
Cole Tuminaro sends a great feed to Chorlton to open the scoring https://t.co/LhAdtycbwz pic.twitter.com/o6rBMDwny8
— Chicago Steel (@ChicagoSteel) September 6, 2025
The American is summarized as mean, physical, and surprisingly quick. He will battle to the very end and utilize some good stick work to both take pucks away and keep pucks on his stick.
Like several other prospects, he is heading down the college route. Tuminaro will start the 2026-27 season at Cornell University to continue developing his game.
Theodore Lechner
Colorado held on to its 152nd pick to take Lechner, another American defender. The 17-year-old right-shot defenseman stands at 6-foot-2 and has a bit more range to his game than Tuminaro.
Lechner played with several teams last season, with the most regular-season games coming with the Academy of Holy Angels in the USHS-MN. In 23 games, he scored seven goals and dished out 31 assists.
He also played in the USHL with the Muskegon Lumberjacks for 21 games with two assists. He also appeared in 14 playoff games, with two more assists.
Lechner can play with a more mobile base and is said to have strong puck retrieval skills with strong skating. He’s upped his game against better players and with more depth, and luckily, he has a lot of runway left to develop even more of his skills.
At only 17 years old, he will start college in 2027 at Augustana University. He joins Axel Elofsson and Tuminaro as defenders taken by Colorado up to this point. The Avalanche still currently has three picks to go in the 2026 NHL Draft, all coming in the seventh round
