After the Anaheim Ducks followed an ineffective loss to the Nashville Predators, a loss in which they managed just one goal, with an effort against the Minnesota Wild that saw them shut out completely by netminder Devan Dubnyk, who was forced to make just 15 saves over 60 minutes of game play, the flame under Ducks head coach Bruce Boudreau's seat seems to have been turned up considerably, to the point now where potential Boudreau replacements are being discussed openly.
Sportsnet's Elliotte Friedman appeared on an episode of Calgary's Sportnet 960 on Monday and indicated that should the rumblings of Boudreau's possibly impending ousting be accurate, he believes assistant Trent Yawney will be the man to take the reins of the talented, but offensively-deficient Ducks.
"I think it's probably going to be Trent Yawney, if they fire Bruce," Friedman said, per Chris Nichols of Todays Slap Shot. "And he's already there. Their assistants are (Rich Preston), they have Paul MacLean and they have Trent Yawney. My guess is it's going to be Trent Yawney, if they make the change."
Yawney, a former NHL player, scout and assistant coach who spent two extremely unsuccessful seasons behind the bench for the Chicago Blackhawks from 2005-06 through just 21 games of the 2006-07 season, is now in his second season with Anaheim as an assistant on Boudreau's staff. Yawney helped Anaheim's AHL affiliate, the Norfolk Admirals, to a spot in the Calder Cup playoffs as the team's head coach during the 2013-14 season.
Yawney's time in Chicago was marked by an organizational tenseness and one-track defensive-mindedness that seemed to emanate from the head coach. With the Ducks already gripping their sticks so tightly and struggling for offense, would he really be the best option for Anaheim?
"There's not going to be a lot - I mean, a lot of people there have been campaigning for Randy Carlyle to come back," said Friedman. "There's Paul MacLean. There's Trent Yawney. I mean, they're all pretty serious guys. I would assume it's going to be Trent, but it could be any one of the three."
MacLean is another former NHL head coach who won the Jack Adams Award as the NHL's Coach of the Year when he was with the Ottawa Senators in 2013. And Carlyle is, of course, the recently-departed head coach of the Toronto Maple Leafs, fired by Brendan Shanahan and Co. midway through last season.
In short, options abound for Anaheim and GM Bob Murray, it's just that none seem all that palatable and all mostly represent retreads of other franchise's failures. Murray has gone on record in the past stating that he views firing his head coach as a last resort.
While a team with as much offensive firepower as the Ducks should certainly have more than six goals through seven games of the 2015-16, far and away the worst mark in the league, and something is clearly amiss in Anaheim, the question Murray and Ducks fans have to ask themselves, is, are Carlyle, MacLean or Yawney really better options to turn around a struggling Ducks team?
And would the, no doubt, loud and clear wakeup call the Ducks players get from Boudreau's potential firing last for more than a week or two, at which point Anaheim could very well find themselves right back right where they started, but facing an overall loss behind the bench.
