Ducks Fire Coach in Bid to Halt Nose Dive

The Mighty Ducks fired Coach Craig Hartsburg on Thursday, reaching another signpost in a downward spiral after a promising beginning eight years ago.

Hartsburg was let go 33 games into the season and replaced by his top assistant, Guy Charron, who has 16 games of experience as a National Hockey League head coach. He becomes the fourth coach for an organization that once soared, but now wallows.

Hartsburg, who was in his third season, had a record of 80-88-29 with Anaheim. The Ducks are in last place in the NHL’s Pacific Division, the same position they were in at the end of last season.

Their fan base, so strong for so long, has eroded to the point where the Arrowhead Pond is half empty most game nights. Sales of their merchandise, once among the most popular in professional sports, have lagged.

Public relations gaffes, from the 1997 firing of Ron Wilson, the team’s first coach, to star player Paul Kariya’s holdout in the 1997-98 season, have hurt. Ticket prices have skyrocketed and are up 49% since the initial season of 1993-94.

The Ducks hope fans will flock back when the team rebounds, something they look to spark with this coaching change. “We believe if we put a winning team on the ice and have success, the fans will be there,” General Manager Pierre Gauthier said. “The fans have been very supportive of this franchise, and like anywhere else, they want a winner. The sooner the better for everybody.”

At least some fans agree.

“You don’t win, you should be out,” said Ralph Acosta, 36, a computer salesman from Orange. “Maybe the players will sit up and take notice. Someone has to pay when a team should be playing well but keeps losing and losing and losing.”

Charron, 51, is in his eighth year as an NHL coach. He was an assistant with the Calgary Flames from 1990 to 1995 and the New York Islanders from 1995 to 1997. He was head coach of the Flames at the end of the 1991-92 season, going 6-7-3 in that stint.

Most of Charron’s professional head coaching experience came with the Grand Rapids Griffins of the International Hockey League, whom he guided to a 85-62-17 record from 1998 to 2000.

Auspicious Beginnings

For the Ducks, there was a time when winning didn’t seem to matter. All officials had to do was fling open the doors and, no matter how well the team played, fans would flock to the Arrowhead Pond. The Ducks sold out every game in 1994-95, despite a record of 16-27-5 and an owner’s lockout that turned off some fans.

The team sold out 90 of 93 games from December 1993 through October 1996. The Ducks are averaging 13,432 this season, and that’s tickets sold. Estimates of fans in the arena are significantly lower. In 14 home games this season, there have been five announced crowds under 12,000, including a franchise-low 11,134 for a game against St. Louis on Oct. 8.

“I don’t think [firing] the coach is going to matter. Any team that plays in Southern California, especially Orange County, needs to leave before they’re going to turn it around,” said Tom Trapp, 24, a self-employed Newport Beach businessman. “Look at the Rams and the Raiders. The Ducks should just leave Orange County.”

Actually, many Duck fans say firing a coach did matter.

The Ducks’ high-water mark was in 1996-97, when they qualified for the Stanley Cup playoffs for the first time. They defeated Phoenix in the first round and lost to eventual champion Detroit in the second round.

Fan interest was at an all-time high. But then a personality clash with former Duck president Tony Tavares cost Wilson, a fan favorite, his job.

Pierre Page was brought in as coach, but then the popular Kariya missed the first 32 games in a contract holdout, with fans again blaming Tavares. The team finished 26-43-13 and Page was fired.

One hockey official familiar with the Ducks’ organization has said that “the start of the demise and the dismantling of the Ducks” began with the firing of Wilson.

“It didn’t work out,” the official said, “and things kept chipping away at the glow after that.”

Sales of Duck merchandise, once as popular as that of the Dallas Cowboys, Chicago Bulls and New York Yankees, has dropped. Season ticket sales, which team officials limited to 12,500 the first seasons, were down 15% when this season began.

Internal problems and struggles have hurt the team as well. The team has had three marketing directors in the last three seasons. There have been three media relations directors since the 1997-98 season.

Gauthier was hired as general manager and team president in 1997-98. There was immediate friction between Gauthier and Tavares, who relinquished his president title but remained chairman and governor of the team.

With that upheaval in the background, the Ducks made the playoffs in 1998-99, losing to Detroit in the first round. They meandered through last season and fan support evaporated.

“Our job is to try win hockey games and that’s what the fans want,” Gauthier said. “They want to win now. I think they all understand how a hockey team is built. To become a Detroit or a Dallas or a Colorado or New Jersey, there is a building process.”

That process rolled over Hartsburg on Thursday.

“I went to the Ducks game a few weeks ago when they played Colorado, and the players looked lifeless, absolutely lifeless,” said businessman John May, 33, of Newport Beach.

“The big guys just aren’t stepping up. [Teemu] Selanne, Kariya--they’re just not doing it. I know the old adage is ‘You can’t fire all the players,’ but firing the coach isn’t going to make a difference if the players don’t step up.”

* NEW DUCK COACH

Guy Charron is “a very positive person,” says his boss. D1

* DIANE PUCIN

Once again, Disney’s Ducks picked the cheap solution. D1