Colorado Avalanche Top 25 Under 25, #23 Sergei Boikov

The Top 25 Under 25 is a collaboration by members of the Mile High Hockey writing staff. Our writers, plus a special vote from the readers, ranked players under the age of 25 as of September 1, 2017 in the Colorado Avalanche organization. Each participant used their own metric of current ability and production against future projection to rank each player. Now, we’ll count down each of the 25 players ranked.

Drafted two years ago out of the Drummondville Voltigeurs, Sergei Boikov comes in on the list at 23.

At 19 and in his second year of draft eligibility, Boikov was not listed in the top 210 North American skaters in the Central Scouting rankings. The Av’s chose to draft him 161st overall.

This will be Boikov’s third season playing professionally, but only his second full pro-season.

Boikov first joined the San Antonio Rampage in the 2015-16 season, after posting a career best 26 points in 52 games for the Voltigeurs. He spent only four games with the Rampage and posted zero points.

In his first full pro-season, Boikov would spend a majority of his time in the AHL putting up 3 goals and 13 assists for 16 points in 63 games. Boikov played 7 games for the Colorado Eagles in the ECHL before playing a huge role in the playoffs as the Eagles went on to win their first Kelly Cup Championship. He displayed a rather offensive spurt as he notched 3 goals and 7 assists for 10 points in 18 games.

While Boikov has never put up impressive offensive numbers, even for a defenseman, that’s okay. The key to Boikov’s game is not his offensive output but rather his ability to stunt the opponents. The young defenseman is known for his hard hits and combative ability.

He has been referred to as “a nasty defenseman who will certainly staple you to the end boards if given the chance.” While his emphasis is put on a physical game, and his production level might have already peaked, there is still a chance he finds a bit of a scoring touch in his second pro-season. But if not, he has a knack for preventing scoring opportunities and battling, which will make him an asset to the Av’s system.

As a player who has not hit his ceiling for sure yet, as defenseman sometimes take longer to develop, Boikov should get a decent shot in the AHL with the Rampage. Best case scenario for this prospect is that he reaches a new offensive game but keeps his defensive edge that has allowed him to shut down his opponents as he has so far.