ANAHEIM, Calif. – Good, bad or otherwise, preseason results are always taken with a grain of salt, and the Anaheim Ducks will take a dip in the Salton Sea after Wednesday night, as the Los Angeles Kings thoroughly dominated the Ducks, 3-1, at Honda Center.

“It was definitely not a good showing,” Ducks coach Joel Quenneville said. “I think that tonight we got outplayed basically off every face off, a lot of loose pucks. We didn’t want to come up with any 50-50 battles all night, so they had the puck. The score could have been worse. Our goalies were good.”

Lukáš Dostál made his preseason debut stopping 17 of 18 shots before a planned goalie switch midway through the third period. Calle Clang made 10 saves on 12 shots in his second half of work.

Los Angeles outshot Anaheim, 30-14, but the Ducks did hold the Kings 0-for-6 on the power play.

“You’re making decisions on a daily basis,” Quenneville said, “and we told the players, you guys make the decisions for us by how you play and how you compete. So there’s still a lot of time left.”

The Ducks next play the Kings again for the third of four preseason meetings on Saturday in Bakersfield.

Lukáš Dostál shines early

It was encouraging to see Anaheim’s offseason investment pay off almost immediately, as Dostál was extremely sharp to open the game.

Dostál, who inked a five-year, $6.5 million-per-year contract in the summer, stopped the first 11 shots before a broken play turned into a two-on-one with a near perfect backhand to beat the Czech netminder for his only goal allowed.

Despite the Ducks dismal defensive work on Wednesday, Dostál was actually appreciative of the early looks.

“Honestly, I was glad, because, if I would be there sitting on 10-minute mark and I would have like two, three shots, you would be wondering, okay, like, how it’s going to go the rest of the game,” Dostál said, “but I felt really good, you know, got could get my feet going right away. So it was good. You don’t have much time to think.”

While the goalie switch was planned, it looked like ill-fated timing, as Anze Kopitar bumped into Dostál’s head just a minute before the Ducks goalie left the game and went down the hall. Dostál made a flashy glove save before coming out for Clang, and Kopitar did check on him to apologize.

“I’m good,” Dostál said. “I appreciate that he came to say sorry, but it’s part of the game, so it’s all good.”

While the early work knocked the rust off Dostál, the Ducks ultimately weren’t helpful to either goaltender and were continually hemmed in their own zone.

“You want to take the hesitation out of the game, the thinking part,” Quenneville said. “It should be instinctual as you go along here and you practice every day, so it’s almost like it becomes a habit… Over the course of the year there’d be some games you’re very disappointed in, you’re just sitting there, but it’s too early, and we’ll think about why we could have been at this level today. I don’t have a great answer right now, but it certainly was disappointing.”

There is something to be said about the continued learning curve of their new defensive zone system early in the preseason, but Anaheim simply couldn’t clear the puck in most instances, unable to get it all the way around the boards or off their stick.

“I think we just need to clean it up,” Jackson LaCombe said. “I think we’re just doing a good job at learning how to play the zone system, and it’s a little bit different, but I think we just gave them a lot of space and just got to learn how to take that away.”

Trouba-Mintyukov pair struggles

It wasn’t a preseason debut to remember for Jacob Trouba with a minus-3 rating and two penalties. Attribute it to shaking the rust off

It was the second preseason game for his defensive partner Pavel Mintyukov, and after a ho-hum debut on Sunday against the Kings in Ontario, the young Russian had his struggles against Los Angeles on Wednesday.

Mintyukov finished as a minus-2, took a penalty in the first period and was also caught pinching on the breakout that led to the Kings’ odd-man rush opening goal. The 21-year-old also got caught with his man behind the net and himself alone in front on a backdoor goal that Trouba couldn’t tie up.

However, there were some promising offensive rush chances for Mintyukov early, and ultimately, that’s not something Quenneville wants to take out of his game.

“I think we want to make sure that confidence is part of the game,” Quenneville said. “He’s coming to camp in good shape. Tests well. He’s an important player for us, so we need him to be confident and productive and defending and predictable, and I think that it’s early, but our defense is–we’ve got some guys that are pushing for some consideration, but Minty should be fine.”

After Monday’s morning skate, Quenneville also preached a “good offense comes from good defense” approach for Mintyukov.

“You start gaining confidence in all situations and handling the puck and seeing plays,” Quenneville said. “Whether it’s power play time or offensive draws or things like that, I think young defensemen, you want to make sure you can use them in all areas and I think that’s the area of his game where, absorbing more responsibility whether it’s defensively and offensively, that’s kind of complimentary to how we want to play.”

Small little thing, but an example of how Quenneville’s systems/mindset will benefit mobile def. LaCombe, Mintyukov, Zellweger.

Mintyukov picks up the puck, goes forward, forward, forward on a give and go, deep into the o-zone. Nothing comes of it, but nice to see.#FlyTogether pic.twitter.com/qkBkVP25ZG

— Zach Cavanagh (@ZachCav) September 25, 2025

Penalty Kill Holds the Fort

When hired back in July, new Ducks assistant coach Ryan McGill’s work over the last three seasons’ with New Jersey was touted as a selling point, particularly helming the Devils penalty kill to the second-best man-down unit in the NHL last season.

““If we get anywhere close to (McGill’s previous success), I’ll be ecstatic,” Verbeek said in July.

There’s early signs of that so far this preseason. Anaheim has killed all 11 power plays its faced over the first three games, but with the first two games featuring various levels of roster quality for both their opponents and the Ducks, Wednesday was a test against the Kings’ top guys.

Anaheim seemingly passed the test, holding Los Angeles’ extra-man unit 0-for-6 with just five shots on goal.

“Well, it’s a work in progress there. We’re spending a lot of time on it,” Quenneville said.
”We’re doing a lot of talking about different situations, recognizing entries, recognizing pressure points, and recognizing when we all go, and sometimes we got to make sure that we get clears, and we get big blocks, and I thought that in the short amount of time, there’s a process. We’re going to try to build through this camp that we know we have to be better in that area.”

Ducks penalty kill units vs LA:

Granlund-Killorn
LaCombe-Helleson

Carlsson-Gauthier
Hinds*-Trouba (*Mintyukov in the box)

Poehling-Colangelo
LaCombe-Trouba#FlyTogether

— Zach Cavanagh (@ZachCav) September 25, 2025

Anaheim Ducks Line Combinations:

Cutter Gauthier-Leo Carlsson (A)-Troy Terry

Chris Kreider-Mikael Granlund-Alex Killorn (A)

Nikita Nesterenko-Ryan Poehling-Sam Colangelo

Ross Johnston-Tim Washe-Yegor Sidorov

Jackson LaCombe (A)-Drew Helleson

Pavel Mintyukov-Jacob Trouba

Stian Solberg-Tristan Luneau

Lukáš Dostál-Calle Clang

Los Angeles Kings Line Combinations

Andrei Kuzmenko-Anze Kopitar-Adrian Kempe

Kevin Fiala-Quinton Byfield-Alex Laferriere

Jeff Malott-Samuel Helenius-Akil Thomas

Jamsen-Connors-Martin Chromiak

Joel Edmundson-Brandt Clarke

Jared Woolley-Kyle Burroughs

Darcy Kuemper-Erik Portillo