Anaheim Ducks 2024-2025 Season Preview
The Anaheim Ducks are set to embark on their 31st season in franchise history on Saturday, October 12, 2024 at the SAP Center, where they will take on the San Jose Sharks. This will mark Greg Cronin’s second season as the head coach behind the bench in Anaheim, and it is the first season of the Ducks’ lauded and well-received rebrand. On the ice, the collective eye of diehard Ducks fans will undoubtedly be focused on the potential development of the Ducks’ elite young core of talented players.
Heading into tonight’s opening game in the City by the Bay, Crash The Pond will evaluate the main takeaways from the Ducks’ 2023-2024 campaign, review what was a surprisingly dormant offseason, and preview what to look for in the upcoming 2024-2025 season. All statistics are provided courtesy of Evolving Hockey unless otherwise noted.
2023-2024 aNAHEIM dUCKS sEASON reVIEW
Despite enduring a franchise record sixth consecutive season missing the playoffs, the Anaheim Ducks sported a much-improved on-ice product during the 2023-2024 season. A modicum of progress was all but guaranteed after the Ducks’ historically inept 2022-2023 campaign, but tangible strides were clearly made in all areas of team play.
Anaheim finished with a 27-50-5 record (59 points; 7th in Pacific Division; 30th in NHL), which was only 1 point better than their 2022-2023 point total. However, the team’s underlying numbers were significantly improved. As a chilling reminder, Anaheim posted a league-worst 38.8% xGF and 40.8% CF at even strength during the 2022-2023 season, which were the worst and 2nd worst EV xGF% and CF% metrics for an NHL team since the 2007-2008 season. During the 2023-2024 campaign, Anaheim improved to 45.6% xGF and 45.1% CF, which ranked 29th and 30th in the NHL, respectively. While these below average metrics are nothing to boast about, they are contextually important as concrete evidence that Greg Cronin’s new coaching system achieved measurable improvements in team play, even with key young players missing considerable time due to injury (in particular, Trevor Zegras and Leo Carlsson).
Anaheim’s xGF% (shown below for the entire 2023-2024 season, courtesy of MoneyPuck) was considerably improved compared to the previous season. The below graph applies a 5-game moving average for xGF%; a game-by-game analysis shows that the Ducks posted a 5v5 xGF above 50% in 32 of 82 games (39%). By comparison, this number was a dismal 11 of 82 (13%) last season.
From an on-ice perspective, Greg Cronin helped transformed the Ducks in his first season behind the bench from historically futile to below average. While this still resulted in another trip to the NHL Draft Lottery and remained a frustrating season for playoff-thirsy diehard Ducks fans, an objective assessment of team play showed substantial and much-needed progress during the 2023-2024 season.
2024 Offseason Review
The 2024 offseason was relatively quiet for the Ducks compared to their chaotic 2023 offseason, which included a coaching change and a much larger number of player departures and arrivals. Here, we will highlight a few of the significant offseason developments this past summer before diving into our Crash The Pond 2024-2025 Season Preview.
Sennecke Shocker at the NHL Draft
The 2024 NHL Draft descended upon the Sphere in Las Vegas, Nevada from June 28-29, 2024. The Ducks had earned the #3 pick in the draft, and the drama surrounding their lottery selection this season paled in comparison to last season’s rampant debate amongst the fanbase for picking Leo Carlsson or Adam Fantilli at #2 overall. This year’s consensus #1 pick was forward Macklin Celebrini, who was selected by the San Jose Sharks. However, a broad range of outcomes was predicted to be possible for the remaining lottery teams. Anaheim ultimately selected forward Beckett Sennecke at #3, thoroughly shocking the 18-year old Toronto native and coming as somewhat of a surprise to the Ducks’ fanbase. Elite Prospects racked Sennecke #9 among all prospects, and touted his “deft playmaking, manipulation, powerful net drives, and puck-thievery skills to control the game”.
Image credit: Steve Marcus/Associated Press
Sennecke will start the 2024-2025 season in the OHL, but he projects to be a major piece in the Ducks’ top-6 forward group in the near future.
Free Agency/Trade Departures and Arrivals
At the start of this offseason’s free agency period, Pat Verbeek reportedly made large offers to star free agent forwards Steven Stamkos and Jonathan Marchessault, but they both ultimately signed with the Nashville Predators. This rendered the remainder of the free agency period as a very quiet one for Anaheim, but this may also be looked back upon as a blessing in disguise when the team is eventually forced to pay lengthy and pricey contracts to members of their young core in upcoming offseasons.
Instead of making a splash in the deep end of the free agency pool, Verbeek waded in the cost-effective splash deck and re-signed forward Brett Leason and defenseman Urho Vaakanainen to 1-year, ~$1.1million deals. Verbeek also acquired forward Robby Fabbri and defenseman Brian Dumoulin via trades. Fabbri and a conditional 2025 4th round draft pick were acquired from the Detroit Red Wings in exchange for goaltender Gage Alexander; Dumoulin was acquired from the Seattle Kraken in exchange for a 2026 4th round draft pick. After John Gibson’s unexpected trip to the injured reserve list due to a ruptured appendix, Verbeek also claimed goaltender James Reimer off waivers during the preseason.
Fabbri and Dumoulin’s RAPM charts (courtesy of Evolving Hockey) tallied over their last three seasons (2021-2024) are shown below, as is their tracking data over the 2020-2024 period (courtesy of Corey Sznajder as part of the All Three Zones Project).
Fabbri has been a sieve defensively, and has particularly struggled with Zone Entries, while Dumoulin has earned a reputation as a shutdown defenseman who has excelled at Defensive Zone Retrievals and Exits.
fIVE keY qUESTIONS FOR THE 2024-2025 aNAHEIM duCKS sEASON
1. Can the Ducks rectify their penalty problem?
The Ducks led the NHL in penalty minutes during the 2023-2024 season (1,108 PIM). Whether or not Anaheim can ascend into Wild Card contention this season will largely depend on their ability to lessen the adverse team impacts of taking far too many penalties.
2. Will the Ducks avoid catching the injury bug?
One of the most frustrating themes of the 2023-2024 Ducks season was the rash of injuries that plagued key players. Avoiding bad injury luck this season, especially to vital pieces of their young core, could substantially bolster the pace of development and chemistry-building throughout the team. We note that for the below table, some of Leo Carlsson’s missed games were due to the load management program that the Ducks were implementing for him throughout last season.
3. Will Trevor Zegras have a breakout season coming off an injury-plagued 2023-2024 campaign?
Sporting a robust and extensive new mullet this offseason, Ducks forward Trevor Zegras will be aiming for a breakout season after missing 51 games last season due to osteitis pubis. Zegras’ career tracking data over the 2020-2024 period, provided once again courtesy of the All Three Zones Project, illustrates a tale of two zones throughout the start to his NHL career: elite across-the-board offensive metrics, and a dearth of defensive consistency, especially in Defensive Zone Retrievals and Exits.
Zegras’ play this season will not only have a significant impact on the Ducks’ team success, but could also go a long way towards determining whether or not he receives another contract in Anaheim beyond the end of next season when his current deal expires.
4. Will Lukáš Dostál emerge as the #1 goaltender in the wake of John Gibson’s early season absence?
Presumptive opening night starting goaltender John Gibson was unexpectedly sent to Injured Reserve after a sudden bout of appendicitis, thereby rendering 24-year old Lukáš Dostál as the Ducks’ opening night starter. Dostál has produced very solid numbers during the last two seasons as Gibson’s backup. In the 2022-2023 and 2023-2024 seasons, he posted a +3.53GSAx and +2.70 GSAx, respectively. Last season, he appeared in 44 Games, which was his largest workload in any single season to date.
Ducks fans will be looking for Dostál to emerge as the team’s top netminder, especially if the annual John Gibson Trade Rumors actually come to fruition during the season.
5. Will new powerplay coaching schemes result in improved on-ice results?
Newell Brown, the Ducks’ powerplay architect from 2021-2024, was relieved of his duties during the offseason. Pat Verbeek subsequently hired Richard Clune, formerly of the Toronto Maple Leafs organization, as an Assistant Coach who will run Anaheim’s powerplay during their 2024-2025 campaign. The Ducks’ powerplay was abysmal last season under Brown, ranking last in the NHL in PP xGF/60 (6.72). With a very talented top 6 forward and top 4 defensive group, all eyes will be on Clune this season to see if he can facilitate an environment to improve the Ducks’ powerplay.
2024-2025 Anaheim Ducks Starting Lineup Projections
cRASH tHE pOND sTAFF 2024-2025 SEASON prEDICTIONS
1. What is your projection for the final Pacific Division Standings?
2. Who will be the Ducks’ Most Valuable Player?
Jake: Trevor Zegras
Felix: Leo Carlsson
CJ: Leo Carlsson
Mike: Trevor Zegras
Bob: Trevor Zegras
Eric: Leo Carlsson
Jonathan: Mason McTavish
3. Who will be the Ducks’ Most Improved Player?
Jake: Leo Carlsson
Felix: Trevor Zegras
CJ: Trevor Zegras
Mike: Mason McTavish
Bob: Jackson LaCombe
Eric: Mason McTavish
Jonathan: Trevor Zegras
4. Will the Ducks be buyers or sellers at the Trade Deadline?
Jake: Neither.
Felix: Neither.
CJ: Light sellers.
Mike: Sellers - specifically, Frankie V.
Bob: Conservative buyers.
Eric: Sellers
Jonathan: Conservative sellers.
5. Will either Cam Fowler or John Gibson be traded during the season?
Jake: Fowler: yes. Gibson: no.
Felix: Fowler: yes. Gibson: no.
CJ: Fowler: yes. Gibson: no.
Mike: No to both.
Bob: No to both.
Eric: Fowler: yes. Gibson: no.
Jonathan: Yes to both. And in particular, Fowler will end up in Vancouver.