ANAHEIM — The Ducks conjured memories of last season’s wagon-circling magic as they rallied from a two-goal deficit to beat the Detroit Red Wings, 6-4, with rookie Cutter Gauthier’s first NHL goal factoring significantly into the comeback.
Olen Zellweger scored a goal and picked up the primary assists on tallies by Trevor Zegras and Troy Terry. Leo Carlsson and Brian Dumoulin each chipped in two assists, as did Drew Helleson in his season debut. Gauthier, Ross Johnston and Ryan Strome joined Terry as third-period scorers while John Gibson moved to 2-0-0 this season by making 21 saves.
Marco Kasper also scored his first NHL goal and assisted on Jonatan Berggren’s goal. Mason Raymond and Alex DeBrincat each matched Kasper’s output with a goal and an assist. Moritz Seider had two helpers and Alex Lyon made 23 saves in defeat.
DeBrincat made the finish more compelling when he plucked a blocked shot attempt off the ice at the side of the net to pop it past Gibson for the Red Wings’ third power-play goal of the night with 3:44 to play, only to see Strome ice the game with 24 seconds showing on the clock by firing the puck into the empty net.
After a seesaw affair for much of the night, the Ducks seized control with two goals in a 38-second spurt at the 11:09 and 11:47 marks of the third period.
Jansen Harkins and Johnston burst into the offensive zone on a partial two-on-one rush that culminated in Harkins’ shot being tipped home by Johnston for his first goal of the year.
That came on the heels of the first goal of Gauthier’s career, which he blasted to the far side after a slick blue line-to-blue line pass by Helleson. It represented a milestone goal for a coveted prospect, Gauthier, and Helleson’s first NHL point since April of 2023.
Less than four minutes into the closing stanza, the Ducks made it a new game at 3-3 while simultaneously tying the power-play-goal tally, 2-2. After they stormed the net with four shot attempts in three seconds on one zone entry, they scored on another. Zellweger dished to Terry atop the left faceoff circle, where he loaded the puck into a shooting position but sold a pass with his eyes before punishing Lyon for moving off his angle with a seeing-eye wrist shot.
The Ducks had pulled within a goal and nearly came up with a second-period equalizer as they scored on the power play with 2:16 left and drew another penalty 28 seconds later that led to some dangerous looks.
They gained new life with a man-advantage marker by Zegras set up by the brilliance of Zellweger. Zellweger carried the puck from behind his own net to the offensive blue line, where he executed a give-and-go play with Alex Killorn before finding the trailing Zegras, who drove the net uncontested and unmolested to snap the puck past Lyon. It was the second goal of the season for Zegras, who scored an empty-netter in the season opener on Oct. 12.
Detroit appeared to pull away just 65 seconds into the middle frame off a transition sequence that was both keyed and finished by Raymond.
Raymond knocked the puck off Pavel Mintykuov’s stick in the defensive zone, where it was collected by DeBrincat. His pass off the right-wing wall sent Raymond ahead with speed for a short-side shot from the right faceoff dot. It was his second goal and team-leading 15th point of the campaign. He nearly scored a second goal, only to be denied when the puck stood on the handle of Gibson’s stick as if it were a spatula.
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Though the Ducks struck first, Detroit’s two power-play tallies gave them a 2-1 lead at the first intermission.
Late in the frame, Helleson and Radko Gudas took penalties three seconds apart from each other, testing the will of the Ducks’ iron three with nearly two full minutes of two-man disadvantage. With 44 seconds left in the period, Vladimir Tarasenko recovered the puck and sent it along the bottom of both faceoff circles. His seam pass found Berggren for a kneeling one-timer that gave Dostál little chance at a save. After starting the year with 13 scoreless outings, Berggren had a goal in consecutive games.
After trailing early, Kasper nearly knotted the score when Strome’s saucer pass out of the corner of the defensive zone was nearly the primary assist on a Detroit goal. Gibson denied Kasper’s point-blank bid but couldn’t come up with a save on his perfectly placed wrister from the left hash mark at 7:59. Kasper snuck off the bench during a drawn-out line change, creeping in for his first career goal.
The Ducks got the crowd going a mere 72 seconds into the match. Strome won an offensive-zone faceoff before Leo Carlsson found Jackson LaCombe, whose D-to-D pass set up Zellweger’s one-timer through traffic, his third goal of 2024-25.
More to come on this story.