Disney Favors Putting ‘Mighty Ducks’ on Ice : Hockey: Despite cold reception, company officials have voiced preference to naming new Anaheim franchise after movie. Decision could come this week.

With many of the weightier issues resolved about Disney’s new professional hockey team for the Anaheim Arena, one remains: Will it be the Mighty Ducks slapping the pucks?

Walt Disney Co. Chairman Michael Eisner, who first floated the name when Disney’s intentions were announced Dec. 11, has been adamant in defending his plan to adopt the name of Disney’s hit movie that starred Emilio Estevez as coach of a youth hockey team. Despite a lukewarm reception, Eisner said last week that the Mighty Ducks is the “front-runner” and there is no second choice.

But other names--including those of mammals, birds and natural disasters--are still being mentioned. They include the Anaheim Thunder, California Cool and the Dalmations.

On Friday, Eisner signaled in an interview that news could come this week, possibly today, on a name and other remaining issues confronting the new team.

“Nothing has been decided yet,” he said. “We’re going to work over this weekend and try to get it put together by next week.”

So far, the Mighty Ducks name has been a winner for Disney.

Audiences caught on to the underdog tale, which is estimated to have cost $7 million to $9 million and has grossed about $50 million since its release in October.

The movie, the story of a convicted drunk driver sentenced to community service as the coach of a peewee hockey team, got mixed reviews. Many critics dismissed it as formula comedy, sort of a “Bad News Bears” on ice.

Still, its creators say that its portrayal of a diverse group of inner-city kids coming together to win “all for one, one for all,” struck a chord among families. Audiences also responded well to Estevez’s character, a yuppie lawyer drowning in excess who is redeemed by his bond with the team.

“They really got hooked to kids coming together as a team,” said Steven Brill, a self-professed hockey fanatic who wrote the script. “It’s like a ‘Rocky’ for kids.”

Moreover, the studio is very serious about the film, its name and cross-promotion possibilities, analysts say. A sequel is scheduled to begin shooting this summer, with much of the same cast expected to return. Some scenes will be shot at the Anaheim Arena in July, even before the first real-life team hits the ice.

“From what I hear, they are going to do it,” name the NHL team the Mighty Ducks, said Jordan Kerner, who produced the movie along with Jon Avnet. “And it will be something to be proud of.”

The name of the team or the arena, however, must have the name Anaheim, according to the city’s management agreement.

During the annual meeting, Walt Disney Co. President Frank Wells said that Eisner would make no further comment on hockey teams or names. As Wells spoke, the name “Mighty Ducks” flashed on the movie-sized screen behind him and Eisner, who were both addressing the audience.

The Mighty Ducks name “is probably a strong possibility,” said Craig Silvers, a research analyst at Crowell, Weedon & Co., a Los Angeles brokerage. “Maybe that’s their sense of humor, but they’ve already established name recognition. It’s sort of funny because that’s what everyone is calling it, even though they haven’t decided.”

The sequel to “The Mighty Ducks,” which has the team moving on to the Junior Goodwill Games in Los Angeles, is expected to be ready by Christmas, Kerner said. When it makes its debut, analysts say it could lend itself to promotions at hockey games, such as ticket discounts or contests. So far, Disney has made no announcement of its plans.

“It would be a natural tie-in,” said John Krier, an analyst with Exhibitor Relations, a box-office research firm. “They got the Disney stores, Disneyland. They do it all the time. (Naming the team the Mighty Ducks) is a good idea. It’s what you call chemistry.”

Disney officials say that they will be exploring how to tie other entertainment entities to the team, such as the Disney Channel, KCAL Channel 9 and Disneyland. The company even has a director of synergy, whose job it is to find ways to cross-promote Disney products and attractions.

“You could look through any number of entertainment possibilities involved in the company and come up with ideas,” said John Dreyer, a spokesman for the Walt Disney Co. “We have a lot of work to do first, like get a team and a coach. Then we will do a lot of brainstorming on how to involve any number of different entertainment segments.”

Already, Disney has its imprint on another sports team that bears the duck name. The University of Oregon football and basketball teams, or the Oregon Ducks, have a mascot that looks a lot like Donald Duck. The team’s colors, green and purple, are almost identical to the team in “The Mighty Ducks.”

The name goes back to the turn of the century, when the university’s sports teams were dubbed the Webfoots for their ability to maneuver through rainy conditions. The school yearbook dubbed them the “Ducks” in the late 1930s, and the moniker stuck.

A few years later, Athletic Director Leo Harris drew upon his friendship with Walt Disney, and the animator’s staff drew renditions of Donald to be used by the university. Apparently, this was well before Disney’s rigid enforcement of its copyrights, because the agreement to use the duck was sealed with only a handshake.

By the 1970s, Disney and the university developed a more formal, written agreement in which they split the 12% collected off the sale of duck T-shirts, hats and mugs.

“It doesn’t generate a lot of income,” said Matt Dyste, the university’s director of licensing. “We probably get about enough to send a family of four to Disneyland for a week. But they’ve been very good to us. It’s Walt’s original intent to allow us the use of the duck as long as we treated him well.”

The duck name, however, invites ridicule, not to mention a few “quacks” from the opposing team’s fans.

The name “does have an effect on how accepted sports is here compared to academics,” said Pat Malach, editor of the Oregon Daily Emerald, the university’s newspaper. “The name ducks isn’t that menacing.”

Yet Malach said that the school’s club cycling team, at national competitions, has done brisk business in trading jerseys bearing the Ducks logo.

The Oregon Ducks football team made it to a bowl game this year with a 6-5 record, but the basketball team just came off a 17-game losing streak. As for its hockey team, often called the Cold Ducks: It’s only a club sport.

“When we lose a game someone might call us ‘the lame Ducks’ or the opposing team might have a fan that holds up a banner that says ‘Duck soup,’ ” said Stan Hellyer, an assistant athletic director. “But we like the name. We plan on having it for a long time. And we’ll be real happy to share the name with a Disney NHL team.”

Since the film’s debut, the name has caught on elsewhere. Producers say the movie has inspired Little League teams across the country to change their names to the Ducks. Brill, the scriptwriter, coined the name from “the idea of all of these peewee hockey players looking like ducks as they crossed the (frozen) pond. . . . Plus there’s the idea of all of the ducks sticking together.”

But having an NHL team named after the movie would be “a dream come true,” Brill said. “It’s great. It’s awesome. I hope they give me season tickets at ice level.”