They pushed a very good Bruins team to the limit and outplayed them at times. It's the same story for these young players.
For the second night in a row, the Anaheim Ducks have put forth a strong effort but lost. Despite outshooting the Boston Bruins 33-28, the Ducks fell 3-1 Sunday.
It was a tightly contested game, with no goals until the third period. There were some heavy hits though. Charlie McAvoy laid a big check on Trevor Zegras in the second period and Radko Gudas responded with two big hip-checks on Trent Frederic and Morgan Geekie respectively.
The Ducks opened the scoring in the third through Mason McTavish. After Frank Vatrano chipped the puck into the neutral zone to McTavish, he chipped it up to himself before dishing to Ryan Strome on the rush. McTavish followed his pass to the middle and deposited the rebound of Strome's shot past Linus Ullmark.
The lead didn't last long though, as Bruins rookie Matthew Poitras collected his first career goal to knot the game at one.
Geekie drove wide and centered the puck which found Poitras in front who got just enough of the puck to put it in past John Gibson.
Poitras then grabbed his second of the game a few minutes later, putting home a Jake DeBrusk rebound, to put the Bruins ahead.
The Ducks pushed late but couldn't solve Ullmark, eventually surrendering an empty netter from Brad Marchand.
Here are three takeaways from Sunday's game:
Defensively Strong Again:
For the second straight night, the Ducks gave up just two goals with a goalie in the net.
While both games ended in losses, this is a big improvement for a Ducks team that allowed the most goals of any team last season.
New head coach Greg Cronin highlighted improving the defensive side of things as a big focus when he came in and is instilling new principles early.
The Ducks look, as a five-man unit, far more connected and stingy right now, leading to much better results defensively.
It's also putting less pressure on their goalies, allowing Gibson and Lukas Dostal to see far fewer high-danger chances against.
When you set your goalies up for success, the team usually benefits and the Ducks are right now.
Just two goals in the last two games is a slight concern, but given the talent in the organization, that issue should fix itself throughout the season and beyond.
The Ducks don't expect a ton of wins this season, but this clear improvement on their biggest weakness last season is encouraging.
A Strong Night For The Penalty Kill:
Talking about weaknesses, the Ducks posted the league's second-worst penalty kill last season and have clearly seen an improvement there as well.
They killed off all five of Boston's power plays — although they only had to kill off about one minute of Zegras' late penalty — after going 4-5 on the kill Saturday.
Like their overall defensive game, the penalty kill seems more in sync right now and are giving more support to the goalies, leading to success.
It's too early for us to declare the penalty kill fixed, but they're clearly moving in the right direction.
Young Players Continue to Impress:
McTavish led the way amongst the Ducks' young players with his goal, but he wasn't the only one to impress.
Despite a -1 rating, Pavel Mintyukov had another strong showing, something he's making a habit out of.
Jackson LaCombe was just okay on Sunday, he had a few turnovers in the game and was bailed out by Gibson, but given his start to the season, one okay game is fine.
Leo Carlsson didn't suit up on Sunday and was a healthy scratch. This was a non-performance-related decision with Carlsson only recently back from injury and the Ducks wanting to manage his workload before cutting him loose in the second half.
The common theme for this game is that it was a loss, but not one that Ducks fans should be too upset about.
They pushed a very good Bruins team to the limit and outplayed them at times. It's the same story for these young players.
They didn't ultimately lead the team to victory, but there were more than enough encouraging signs to feel positive moving forward.