Ducks May Not Be Represented at 4 Nations Face-Off––and That's Okay

Anaheim's potential 4 Nations Face-Off candidates may miss out due to their countries' depth.

The 4 Nations Face-Off isn’t until February. But, rosters must be finalized and announced on Dec. 4. The four countries participating in the tournament are Canada, the United States, Finland and Sweden. The Ducks have several players from these four countries, but it will be difficult for one—if any—to be on the final roster.

Carlsson presents perhaps the best chance of being at the tournament of any Ducks player. The 19-year-old Swede is currently out with an upper-body injury, but the assumption is that he will be healthy enough by February to be on the team.

Sweden boasts formidable depth down the middle with Mika Zibanejad, Mikael Backlund, William Karlsson, Elias Pettersson and Joel Eriksson Ek, to name a few. Carlsson has shown he can play wing. He did so while playing for Örebro in the SHL. His ineffectiveness in the faceoff circle thus far as an NHLer may lend credence to him playing on the wing during the tournament if he does make the team.

But, they’re no slouch in that department either with players like Filip Forsberg, Adrian Kempe, Jesper Bratt and Lucas Raymond, among others. But with the 2026 Olympics just a year after the 4 Nations Face-Off, having what could potentially be one of your international cornerstones on the roster could do a world of good. While Carlsson’s bread and butter is his offensive work, he’s stable defensively and can play on the penalty kill—as he’s done at times for Anaheim.

Carlsson’s compatriot has an outside chance of cracking Sweden’s roster due to his defensive reliability and sound penalty killing. With the number of offensive talents at Sweden’s disposal, having a player like Lundeström to do the so-called “dirty work” would free up players on the team with higher offensive ceilings to flourish.

Lundeström too has shown that he can play both down the middle and on the wing. However, the likelihood of Lundeström making the team as anything besides an injury alternate seems unlikely.

Terry suffers the unfortunate fate of being an American NHLer during a point where Team USA may be able to deploy one of their deepest rosters for a tournament ever.

He’s gone six games without a goal (he nearly had one on Friday against the Kings), but is on a three-game point streak and has demonstrated how influential he can be on any given night. Though he doesn’t kill penalties for the Ducks, his defensive work is among the best on the team with his ability to easily generate takeaways on the forecheck.

It would be a formidable task for Terry to crack the U.S. roster because of how strong the team is up front. Being left off the roster says more about how many options Team USA general manager Bill Guerin has at his disposal than it does about Terry’s play this season.

Vaakanainen’s path to a spot on Finland’s roster could have been made easier by Jackson LaCombe’s early struggles and Tristan Luneau’s demotion to the AHL. But an upper-body injury suffered against the Vegas Golden Knights earlier this month has kept Vaakanainen out of action since.

While the expectation is that he will be healthy by the time the tournament arrives, he doesn’t play regularly enough to warrant being selected over the available, but few, options for the Finnish blue line.

Team USA’s top two goaltenders are Connor Hellebucyk and Jake Oettinger. There’s not much debate about that, but the No. 3 spot is up for grabs. Again, there are several options here and it would be a tall task for Gibson to end up in that spot. He’s played well though since returning from an emergency appendectomy to the tune of .916 SV%, 2.48 GAA and a 5.8 GSAx in six games (all starts).

Honorable mentions go to Trevor Zegras—who’s picked up his play as of late—and Olen Zellweger, who also shares the same unfortunate fate as Terry in hailing from a country where the depth at his position is astounding.

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