The Ducks entered the year hoping to buck a trend by making the playoffs for the first time in eight seasons. But they\u2019ll start by changing their migration patterns as four members of the flock will be flying east for the winter.<\/p>\n
The destination will be the Winter Olympics, more specifically, where four Ducks will pull their respective countries\u2019 illustrious sweaters over their heads in Milan. The Ducks and Kings have a combined nine Olympians, as many as top producers Florida and Tampa Bay sent individually.<\/p>\n
Leo Carlsson, forward, Sweden<\/p>\n
Carlsson was the second-youngest NHL player named to an Olympic side, behind Canada\u2019s Macklin Celebrini, 19, and months younger than fellow 21-year-olds Juraj Slafkovsk\u00fd and \u0160imon Nemec of Slovakia. Carlsson was the youngest player at last year\u2019s 4 Nations Face-Off, where he wet his feet and received plaudits for his neutral-zone play and puck transportation from the Tre Kronor management team.<\/p>\n
He had a scorching start to his contract year with 25 points in 15 games. While he has cooled off in his past half-dozen matches, Carlsson projects to be a franchise center for the Ducks, and he could join the Swedish pantheon of pivots that includes Peter Forsberg, Mats Sundin, Henrik Zetterberg and Henrik Sedin.<\/p>\n
Luk\u00e1\u0161 Dost\u00e1l, goalie, Czechia<\/p>\n
His performance at the World Championships two years ago, when the Czechs took gold as tournament hosts, was as heralded as any since Dominik Ha\u0161ek\u2019s supernatural sprint to gold at 1998\u2019s Nagano Games. It was also a unifying experience for the country.<\/p>\n
The Czechs face an uphill climb at the Olympics, with Canada and Team USA atop the oddsmakers\u2019 leaderboards. The Czechs currently have the shortest odds of any European nation, 25-to-1 per ESPN, and Dost\u00e1l is comfortable in an underdog role. He was an unsung prospect and, since establishing himself firmly as an NHL starter, has frequently had to work miracles in net to earn wins.<\/p>\n
Radko Gudas, defenseman, Czechia<\/p>\n
Gudas joined Dost\u00e1l on the World Championship dash two years ago following his first season as a Duck. Last year, he became the Ducks\u2019 captain, but has been hindered somewhat by injuries since, the price of his selfless, rough-and-tumble approach to defense.<\/p>\n
Given the absence of NHL players from the past two Olympic cycles, first-time Olympians were the norm this time around. However, Gudas is one of the exceptions, having competed in the 2014 Sochi Games. The Czechs failed to medal there, losing to Team USA in the quarterfinals.<\/p>\n
Mikael Granlund, forward, Finland<\/p>\n
Granlund is another returning Olympian from 2014, when he, the Finns and 43-year-old tournament MVP Teemu Selanne won bronze in Russia. Granlund contributed an impressive seven points in six games, placing him right behind tournament scoring leaders Erik Karlsson (Sweden) and Phil Kessel (USA).<\/p>\n
Granlund signed a three-year, $21 million pact with the Ducks over the summer. Though a lower-body injury cost him 18 games, he has shown flashes of brilliance. They began with his five-point game on Oct. 23 and continued last month with a four-game goal streak.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"The Ducks entered the year hoping to buck a trend by making the playoffs for the first time…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":118218,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[36],"tags":[163,824,165,164,404,10012,127],"class_list":{"0":"post-118217","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-anaheim","8":"tag-anaheim","9":"tag-anaheim-ducks","10":"tag-anaheim-headlines","11":"tag-anaheim-news","12":"tag-nhl","13":"tag-olympics","14":"tag-sports"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/118217","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=118217"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/118217\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/118218"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=118217"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=118217"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=118217"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}