With the Anaheim Ducks celebrating their 30th anniversary this season, now is the perfect time to look back. In the last 30 years, the Ducks have made history – from the Disney days to winning the first Stanley Cup in California and the decade of contention that followed – and now is the time to look back at the players that made these moments possible.
Related: Anaheim Ducks: Counting Down the 30 Greatest Moments (5-1)
This is the third installment of the countdown. Previous entries can be found below. The countdown will conclude at the end of this week before Anaheim’s opening game on Saturday, Oct. 14.
15. Jakob Silfverberg
Jakob Silfverberg first arrived in Anaheim by way of the Bobby Ryan trade with the Ottawa Senators in 2013. He quickly broke onto the Ducks’ lineup, appearing in 52 regular season games and 13 playoff games in the 2013-14 season. He was one of Anaheim’s more reliable scorers during the mid-2010s, averaging nearly 44 points per 82 games from 2014-2020. He was also a big-time playoff contributor as well, with point totals of 18 and 14 in the 2015 and 2017 postseasons, respectively.
While he was a reliable contributor on offense in his prime, he was also a valuable defender. Silfverberg, along with Ryan Kesler and Andrew Cogliano, formed the team’s primary shutdown line for several seasons. The trio’s best work came in the 2017 playoffs, when the unit had the task of shutting down the Edmonton Oilers, specifically the Connor McDavid line. On top of limiting McDavid’s impact, Silfverberg recorded an overtime winner in Game 4.
Silfverberg’s production has slowed in recent years as younger players have taken a larger role, but he has been a consistent part of the leadership group for four seasons as an alternate captain.
14. Francois Beauchemin
Francois Beauchemin is one of a handful of well-known Ducks players to have several different stints with the organization. He was traded to Anaheim during his rookie season, appearing in 61 regular season and 16 postseason games for the Ducks during the 2005-06 season. The following year, he was locked in as a top-4 defenseman, averaging 25 minutes a night during the regular season and increasing his workload to 30 in the playoffs to help the Ducks capture the Stanley Cup in 2007.
With the Ducks pressed to the salary cap, Beauchemin found his payday with the Toronto Maple Leafs in 2009. After 136 games in Toronto, he was traded back to Anaheim, where he would continue to play for the next four seasons. In the lockout-shortened 2012-13 season, Beauchemin finished fourth in the Norris voting, registering 24 points in 48 games while averaging over 23 minutes per night.
At the conclusion of his contract in 2015, he was once again the odd man out in Anaheim, as he signed with the Colorado Avalanche. Beauchemin gave the young Avalanche a veteran presence on the blue line, but their roster construction in the lead-up to Vegas’ expansion draft necessitated a buy-out in 2017. As a result, the 37-year-old free agent returned to Anaheim for a third stint. In 2017-18, his final season in the NHL, he recorded 17 points in 67 games while serving as a depth defenseman.
Beauchemin’s ranks among Ducks defensemen include third in games played (592), fourth in points (196), and second in hits (881).
13. Ruslan Salei
One of two defensemen to suit up for more games than Beauchemin is Ruslan Salei. Salei was an underrated contributor to the Ducks’ rise in relevance in the late 90s and early 2000s. The Belarusian defenseman was selected ninth by Anaheim in the 1996 NHL Entry Draft and found a full-time spot on the roster by the 1997-98 season. While he rarely contributed to the scoresheet, the man nicknamed “Rusty” was one of the franchise’s first workhorse defensemen. His 594 games remained a Ducks’ franchise record until Cam Fowler surpassed it in 2018.
Salei was a key player during Anaheim’s first trip to the Stanley Cup Final. He appeared in all 21 playoff games in 2003 and registered the overtime-winning goal in Game 3 of the Cup Final, the franchise’s first-ever victory in the championship round.
On Sept. 7, 2011, a passenger plane carrying a majority of the Lokomotiv Yaroslavl hockey team crashed, killing 44 of 45 passengers, including Salei. The tragedy remains one of the darkest in hockey’s history, with fans and former teammates sharing their love and grief.
12. Bobby Ryan
Bobby Ryan’s biggest crime to Ducks fans is that he isn’t Sidney Crosby. By just missing out on the first overall pick in 2005, Anaheim selected Ryan with the second overall pick. After a few years of moving between the minors and the NHL, he cracked the Ducks’ lineup for good in 2008-09 with 31 goals in 64 games. His 57 points set a franchise rookie record that wouldn’t be surpassed until Trevor Zegras in 2022. Ryan would add three more consecutive 30-goal campaigns.
Ryan inked a five-year deal in 2010, but the Ducks weren’t going to be able to maintain their core without some cost-cutting. In 2013, the Ducks traded him to the Senators for Silfverberg, Stefan Noesen, and a first-round pick (eventually used on Nick Ritchie).
Ryan’s legacy in Anaheim will be as one of the best pure goal scorers the franchise has seen. Despite ranking eighth in goals (147), his goals per game of .39 is the third highest in team history behind Teemu Selanne and Paul Kariya.
11. Rickard Rakell
One forward to emerge in the absence of Ryan was Rickard Rakell, a first-round pick from the Ducks in 2011. He was in the lineup by the end of the 2014 season, registering his first career goal against the Dallas Stars in the first round of the Stanley Cup Playoffs. After a few years of centering a depth line, he moved to the wing and was promoted to the top line with Ryan Getzlaf and Corey Perry. While Perry would have been considered the expected scoring threat at the time, Rakell flourished on the “RPG” line. He led the team with back-to-back 30-plus goal campaigns from 2016-2018.
Rakell was a streaky scorer during his tenure in Anaheim, and his production tapered as the team went through some lean years following the 2018 campaign. While assists kept the point totals respectable, the goal-scoring declined to 58 goals over his last 237 games in Anaheim, roughly 20 goals per 82 games played. With the organization looking to rebuild and get younger, he was traded to the Pittsburgh Penguins at the 2022 trade deadline.
Rakell’s goal-scoring and underrated playmaking abilities made him a fan favorite in Anaheim even as the team began to decline in the late 2010s. We’re now down to the top 10 greatest Ducks players of all time. Among these top 10 are two Norris winners, two Rocket Richard recipients, two Conn Smythe trophies, five end-of-year All-Stars, and six members of the 2007 Stanley Cup team. Come back later this week to see how they rank.
Statistics courtesy of Hockey-Reference. Salary and trade details courtesy of CapFriendly.
