Intriguing offseason looms for Ducks GM Pat Verbeek

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IRVINE — It was very much like watching two different teams playing two different seasons, as Dallas Eakins noted Monday. There were the Ducks who achieved a modicum of success up until the NHL’s trade deadline on March 21 and then there were the Ducks who had almost none after it.

Dissecting the full 82-game season wasn’t as easy as it might have sounded, as the Ducks’ coach said during a break in the team’s exit interviews with its players at Great Park Ice. It was difficult to compare and contrast the beginning and middle with the end of 2021-22.

“Those numbers are hard to look at because we coached two different teams this year,” Eakins said of taking a deep dive into the Ducks’ analytics. “That’s the reality of it. I’ve got to break this down. I’ve got to have a start date and an end date on, basically, two different teams here.”

General Manager Pat Verbeek did the difficult but necessary job of dismantling a large part of the Ducks’ core by trading Nicolas Deslauriers, Hampus Lindholm, Josh Manson and Rickard Rakell before the deadline, leaving a roster that was suddenly younger and less experienced and less successful.

In the end, the final results were every bit as lacking as in the previous three seasons. The Ducks (31-37-14) failed to advance to the Stanley Cup playoffs for the fourth consecutive season, the longest postseason drought in franchise history. They faded from contention swiftly and certainly.

Troy Terry’s breakout season, which included a team-leading 37 goals, coupled with Trevor Zegras’ offensive wizardry (a team-best 38 assists) fueled optimism for the future. But Max Comtois’ clunker of a season (six goals this season compared to 16 in 2020-21) was cause for concern.

Enhanced roles for Sam Carrick, Derek Grant and Isac Lundestrom, which included dogged play on an improved penalty kill, couldn’t make up for a minus-39 goal differential. The Ducks’ total of 234 goals was well shy of the Florida Panthers’ league-leading total of 340.

“It’s all goal differential, to me,” Eakins said. “We need to score more goals. We need to get stronger around the net. Sometimes that takes size. Sometimes it takes maturity. A lot of times it takes a choice to go there. Because that’s where goals are scored. Look where the goals are scored. It’s like a mass of them right there. You can’t tip-toe in there. You have to bully your way in there. Or you have to have speed. Speed and size are going to help us score more goals.”

Verbeek wasn’t available to speak to reporters on Monday, but he is expected in the next few days to offer his review of 2021-22 and perhaps give a preview of his offseason plans. Any changes, great or small, are likely to be made to the roster. The coaching staff is set for 2022-23.

Eakins will return to coach the Ducks for a fourth season, after four seasons coaching their AHL team in San Diego, and assistant coaches Newell Brown, Mike Stothers and Geoff Ward will be back for their second seasons. So, there will be continuity among the coaching staff.

Ryan Getzlaf’s retirement after 17 Hall of Fame-caliber seasons with the Ducks, including the past 12 as captain, leaves a huge void in next season’s lineup, especially when coupled with the departures of Deslauriers, Lindholm, Manson and Rakell at the trade deadline.

Comtois, 23, Lundestrom, 22, Terry, 24, Zegras, 21 and Jamie Drysdale, 20 are among the Ducks’ young players who must take additional steps in 2022-23 if the Ducks are to end their streak of playoff whiffs. But they’re going to need help, and that’s where Verbeek must get to work.

“Everyone is looking to see what he’s going to do this offseason,” Ducks defenseman Kevin Shattenkirk said. “We made some big moves at the deadline and lost some guys who were character players on our team and were character human beings. You realized down the stretch we need some more veteran experience in the locker room, so there’s definitely a need there to help these (youngsters) out.

“We saw the steps that guys took this year. That’s the most exciting part of our team. We’ve shown the league that we’re coming and this is a place where guys might want to come and be a part of this process, and that’s the exciting part for me. He keeps his cards close to the chest, but I think he understands the value of having those guys in the locker room.

“He has his plan and a lot of it is going to revolve around our young players. This is a crucial time for them to have the right mentors and the right guys leading the way and guys who have won and have experience, and I think that is something, hopefully, we can get this summer.”

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