Are The Anaheim Ducks Actually Any Good?

They're going to win the Pacific. They still might suck.

Betteridge's Law, folks. Any headline that's a question, the answer is no.

The Anaheim Ducks had something of their event horizon last night, as the Toronto Maple Leafs came in, after firing their GM, claiming to be embarrassed by their response to Radko Gudas's leg-jousting with Auston Matthews and determined to make up for it, while the Ducks were looking to shore up the Pacific Division. Perhaps the Leafs felt their job was done when Max Domi squared up with Gudas off the opening faceoff. But if Max Domi is settling your scores...

Then again, if Max Domi is on your roster at all...

But we're here to talk about the Ducks. They blew a two-goal lead in the third, to the Leafs, then were able to save themselves in the last two minutes of the tactics-free zone of a 6-on-4 power play. They then lost in overtime, where they spend most of their time, as you'll soon see.

The OT loss left the Ducks with a four-point lead at the top of the division, though they'd lose a tiebreaker to the Oilers, should it come to that. On the surface, this is the culmination of a rebuild. They spent a few years in the toilet, all the young talent has coalesced around an ambitious hire of an ambitious and bonafide coach (that shouldn't be in the league). This is how it looks, right? Assemble the pieces, point them in the right direction, tell them when it's time to get serious, get serious.

But in this season, which has been much weirder than the average NHL season, which are weird to begin with, just because a team is on top of a division doesn't mean they're actually good. Everyone being exhausted and hurt, leading to more overtime games than normal, means results can get totally warped. Which would lead to conclusions that are just wrong.

So no, the Anaheim Ducks are not good. Their -7 goal-differential will tell you that. Look around, and see Utah with a +23 goal-difference, or Minnesota at +26, or Washington with a +11 (and they're going to miss the playoffs by a couple highway exits), or Columbus at +13, and you can see how a -7 GD labels the Ducks. Especially in the West, but especially in the Pacific.

What jumps out the most about the Ducks is a 17-5 record after games go beyond 60 minutes. Only the Islanders, with their 14 wins at 60-plus minutes, are anywhere near the Ducks record. In just regulation, Anaheim are four games under .500, at 24-28-22. Luckily for them, no one in the Pacific is actually over .500 in regulation. The best mark is Edmonton, who break even at 28-28-18.

The imbalance between the conferences is actually pretty staggering, when looking at just regulation records. The West only sports three teams, all in the Central, that are over .500 when it comes to 60-minute records. The East has 10.

We can dig a little deeper. The Ducks are a dynamic offensive team. They're third in the league in attempts per 60 at 5-on-5, and sixth in xG per 60. They create a lot. But they can't defend for shit. They're 26th in Corsi-against, and 31st in xGA/60 (only the Hawks are worse). Overall, the Ducks break just about even in attempts and are just below water in xG. Obviously, more things happen in a Ducks game than any other. It is high-event hockey, with Joel Quenneville either figuring that his depth of talent will score more and from more spots than most teams if they turn all the safety catches off, or he's just collecting a check and letting the kids run around like a substitute teacher.

Perhaps Quenneville was counting on continued growth from Lukas Dostol. He hasn't been bad, but he's been forced to see a lot more rubber than he might have expected. His .894 save-percentage comes with a still positive GSAx (3.8), but it's not as high as last season's (14.3). And there's no John Gibson to split time with him and be just as good. Things could have been much worse for the Ducks with someone else other than Dostol, but they may have been counting on more.

The Ducks certainly have depth, with eight guys on 0.5 points-per-game or better. Their top three scorers--Gauthier, Sennecke, Carlsson--would be the core that the Ducks are going to build around for the next decade. If this is only the first step for them, that's awfully exciting. While the likes of Terry, Kreider, Gudas, and Trouba have provided support, the kids are driving the bus here, the aforementioned trio and Jackson LaCombe, who has had his breakout season. If your best players are 20, 21, 22, and 25 and already producing (I said, "already producing." Hawks fans!), the arrow is decidedly pointing up.

But this version has a lot of air in it. Perhaps some of those bills come due next season, which will be a little more normal, a little less 3-on-3, and teams that give up a ton of chances will be found out in regulation a whole lot more. Take five more, well placed regulation goals against the Ducks, and you'd erase 10 points from their total, which would have them level with Nashville.

But this is the NHL in 2025-2026. The standings are lying to you, except for the Central Division. Ottawa and Washington are almost certainly better than most of the rabble in the East trying to lock down wildcard spots, but below .500 records in overtime (and some shoddy goaltending for the Sens, admittedly) have left them outside. At least the Sens are charging. The Blues and Jets are at least as good as the Preds, but overtime has bitten them, too. And 3-on-3 doesn't mean anything. It's random.

The Ducks future is still bright, but it wouldn't be shocking if it's not linear, once they get out of this phantom tollbooth this season has been.