Ducks lose fifth in a row, take stock at season's halfway point

ANAHEIM, Calif. – At the halfway point of the 2024-25 season, the Anaheim Ducks have shown two sides to themselves: an electric offensive dynamo that can outplay its mistakes and a frustrated ground-down group that can’t overcome those same mistakes.

For the last month, it’s been much of the latter, including their first game of the new year on Friday.

Anaheim came out with pace, but after a quick strike power play goal by the Minnesota, the Wild had a stranglehold on the puck to keep the Ducks on the back foot and take advantage of opportunities in a 5-2 win at Honda Center.

Anaheim has now lost five in a row and seven of its last eight games. The Ducks have not led once in the five-game streak and have held a lead in just two of the last 12 games.

“I think some of the mistakes we were making are costing us,” Ducks captain Radko Gudas said, “and sometimes there's mistakes we make are easy to fix, and we're just trying to maybe do a little more extra, maybe, or sometimes trying to do too much with the puck instead of simplifying the game.”

Beckett Sennecke scored for the second straight game, and Troy Terry netted his third goal in three games. Lukas Dostal stopped 29 of 34 shots. U.S. Olympian Quinn Hughes notched four assists for Minnesota.

Friday was the 27th time in 41 games that the Ducks have allowed the first goal and the seventh time in the last eight games. Anaheim is tied for the league lead in games trailing first and is 9-15-3 in those games.

“Tonight wasn't very good,” Quenneville said. “We're playing catch-up hockey a lot, too, which is not conducive to solidifying where we need to get to. But we'll find it, but tonight was a little disappointing.”

Despite this recent slide, Anaheim (21-17-3, 45 points) still sits in a top-three position in the Pacific Division, just one point behind first-place Edmonton (20-15-6, 46 points) and tied with Vegas (17-11-11, 45 points). Vegas has two games in hand on the Ducks and Edmonton.

However, wild cards Seattle (18-14-7, 43 points) and San Jose (20-17-3, 43 points) are nipping at their heels, with Los Angeles (16-15-9, 41 points) still in sight.

“Nobody is really looking at the standings right now,” Gudas said. “It's still halfway through the season. Anything can happen. It's obviously nice to be somewhere in the playoff picture compared to the last few years, where we were a lot of points out or a few points out.”

“But we can’t be looking at the standings right now and be satisfied with anything, if anything, we can’t be satisfied. We gotta get better, we gotta get hungrier, and we gotta find a way to win more games to get finally in the playoffs, and that's something I feel like we can (achieve).”

The Ducks now head out on a four-games-in-six-nights East Coast road trip starting with a back-to-back in Washington on Monday and against Trevor Zegras and Philadelphia on Tuesday.

Lost Comeback Confidence

More so than in any of the blowout losses and certainly more so than competitive losses in the last two games, the Ducks simply looked flummoxed on Friday night.

It was not a game where they didn’t show up. It was not a game where the mistakes were so glaringly obvious. It was a game where Minnesota took control, and the Ducks were simply unable to collect enough of themselves to get back into it.

Even when Quenneville took his self-described “long-shot” by pulling Dostal for the extra attacker down three goals, Anaheim could not find that comeback magic they had early in the season.

“I think when you’re not winning, the confidence with the puck and positioning and trust,” Quenneville said, “It kind of goes away, but nobody's gonna feel sorry for you, you know, it's not just gonna happen magically. You gotta make sure that we dig down and bear down and find a way, and getting back to what makes us a decent team is the little things. The little things there tonight, they showed us, and the last couple teams do it very well.”

“They're smart, they're experienced, and they want to play with the puck, and that's what we want to get to, but look like we distanced ourselves after a game like tonight.”

Minnesota dominated the little things, but the string of non-comebacks is not limited to tonight.

Despite the Ducks being tied for third in the NHL with 11 comeback victories, the Ducks have not had a comeback win since Dec. 9 in Pittsburgh, which took a last-second miracle from Beckett Sennecke to tie the game and superhuman effort in net by third-string Ville Husso to pull out the shootout victory.

However, without the aid of the shootout, the Ducks haven’t had a non-shootout comeback win since Nov. 22 against Vegas, and without three-on-three overtime, Anaheim hasn’t posted a comeback win in regulation since Nov. 6 in Dallas.

“Obviously, it's not the best,” Gudas said about the mood in the Ducks locker room. “It's not the nicest around, but we try to stay as positive as possible. We know we're doing some good things out there. We feel like we're in every game, and just want to make sure that we score a few of the greasy ones.”

“Maybe that's gonna get us over the hump, and we're gonna start feeling better about ourselves, and the confidence is gonna build itself. I think simplify our game and trust it in the system, trust each other. And I think that's the key to get back on track.”

Taking Stock

With 41 games played and 41 games to go, Anaheim is still in a playoff spot.

Despite losing four in a row coming into Friday, the Ducks still could have leapt back into first place in the Pacific Division with a win. They did not, so there’s no need to dwell there, but there’s also something to the fact that the opportunity still exists.

It is the smallest of moral victories for a Ducks team that is clearly down on itself and has problems to fix.

“Unfortunately, that one hurts a lot,” Gudas said of the ramifications, “but, you know, there's still 41 games and we keep learning. We're still a young team, and we want to continue to build our game and we want to learn from our mistakes. But at some point we can't make those mistakes anymore.”

Anaheim certainly needs to take stock of where it is, because while no one is pulling away in front of it, the standings are tightening up behind it.

Where can the Ducks improve? Pretty much everywhere.

For one, the offensive has dried up as teams adjust to their rush opportunities. The Ducks were first in the league in goals per game (4.13) at the end of their seven-game winning streak 15 games into the season. Over the last 26 games, Anaheim is 24th in the league (2.81 goals per game).

Defensively in the first 15 games, the Ducks were 16th best in the league, allowing just 3.07 goals per game. Not outstanding, but good enough for the high-powered offense. In the 26 games since, the Ducks are dead last in the league, allowing 3.85 goals per game.

Even at its best, Anaheim is not a defensive juggernaut. On the other hand, they’re simply not as offensively inept as they have been, and there’s signs to look for a bounce back.

The Ducks shooting percentage has plummeted from 13.7% in those first 15 games (second-best in the league) to just 9% over the last 26 games, third-worst in the league. Even if Anaheim could tick that up a percentage point or two, that could make a world of difference.

That could probably be found in leading scorer Leo Carlsson getting back in gear (one point in seven games, no goals in 10 games), leading goal scorer Cutter Gauthier finding his shooting stroke (one goal in eight games, three goals in 13 games) or Chris Kreider finally just popping one in (one goal and four points in all of December). Their talent didn’t disappear.

In addition to all of that, Lukáš Dostál has shown plenty of times he's a better goaltender than what his December was.

It can’t start tonight. It can only begin tomorrow.

Anaheim holds one last practice in Orange County on Saturday before jetting off to Washington and a four-game road swing.

“Let's go,” Quenneville said. “One at a time and try to recapture some confidence in our game.”