Ducks Looking To Add On The Wing

So far, it’s been a quiet deadline season for Anaheim. The only deal the Ducks have made this season was to acquire depth winger Jeffrey Viel from the Bruins in January.

Now, it appears more additions on the wing could be ahead of a more headline-grabbing variety. Elliotte Friedman of Sportsnet relays that the Ducks are still gauging the market for a top-nine winger and hope to land one ahead of tomorrow’s lineup, calling them a “stealth team.”

While a handful of names have come off the board today – Michael Bunting and Warren Foegele have found new homes in the past couple of hours – there are plenty more available. Options on The Athletic’s latest trade board, published today, include Blake Coleman, Bobby McMann, Conor Garland, Evander Kane, and, to a lesser extent, Jordan Kyrou. Friedman also mentioned Nashville’s Jonathan Marchessault as a name with continued urgency to move after reports of a mutual desire for a trade last month.

Some might gawk at Anaheim’s defensive numbers – they’ve allowed the third-most goals in the league to date – but their under-the-hood numbers are strong. They’re high-event but are controlling the majority of play at 5-on-5 (52.3 CF%, 50.7 SCF%), but have fallen victim to some underwhelming special teams and a recent cold streak from starting netminder Lukáš Dostál after his exceptional start.

Still, their offense hasn’t been overpowering. They’re third in the league with 30.2 shots per game, but their goals per game of 3.25 is much closer to league average at 13th. That’s certainly playoff-caliber, but there’s a clear need to improve their finishing ability to make a deep run in a wide-open Pacific Division in their first year of playoff contention this decade.

Anaheim has gotten exceptional performances from the young players at the top of their lineup, 31-goal man Cutter Gauthier chief among them, but some of their higher-priced veterans in top-nine roles have struggled. Alex Killorn has only eight tallies in 61 games despite averaging over 16 minutes per night. Frank Vatrano and Ryan Strome have combined for just seven goals on the year. Moving two of them to a fourth-line role by adding a top-nine name and getting Mikael Granlund back healthy seems to be high on general manager Pat Verbeek‘s wish list.

Whatever they’re willing to leverage in return will likely be futures-based. There’s been some talk of defenseman Pavel Mintyukov being dangled, but they don’t have the defensive depth to sustain his loss if they’re not taking a D-man back in return.