The Anaheim Ducks have a Nikita Klepov problem, and it’s the kind most teams would love to have.
After trading up in the 2026 NHL draft to land the OHL’s leading scorer, Anaheim signed the 18-year-old to his entry-level deal in late July. Now the Ducks have to decide whether to throw him into the NHL right away or keep him in a development lane that’s already been complicated by the rules around his age and status.
Klepov is in his draft+1 season, which makes this a narrow path. He can’t play in the AHL, and he can’t play in the NCAA anymore.
That leaves the Ducks with two real options this season: keep him in the NHL or send him back to the OHL. Anaheim can also send him to the San Diego Gulls for a conditioning stint of up to 14 days if he’s scratched for five straight games.
So far, the answer has been patience. Klepov has been a healthy scratch through Anaheim’s first two games, both on the road against the Vegas Golden Knights and then at home against the Florida Panthers. Those are no soft landing spots either; both teams are Cup contenders and among the NHL’s more physical groups.
That matters because the Ducks are already leaning hard on young skill. They moved on from Mason McTavish and Chris Kreider, and they’ll also be without Troy Terry for the first 2-3 months of the season. That leaves a lot of scoring responsibility up for grabs, and Klepov’s top-six talent makes him an obvious candidate to help fill some of that space.
Still, head coach Joel Quenneville made it clear before the opener in Las Vegas that the organization was not in a rush.
“Well, it's early, and we're going to get him in a game here real soon. And, I think that offensively, I think he's got some great feel to the game,” Quenneville said before their season-opener in Las Vegas on Friday.
“He's got a great understanding of the game. You know, he's 18.
There's some big guys on our opponents tonight. It's a different night than maybe some other teams.
“And so, watching's not a bad thing, and getting to observe and watching some situations that put yourself in that spot: what would you do, and how would you handle it? But we'll get to see him play.”
There’s precedent for this sort of approach in Anaheim. The Ducks have already shown they’re willing to push young talent sooner than expected when the situation calls for it. Beckett Sennecke was widely thought to be headed back to the Oshawa Generals for his 2025-26 season, but he ended up playing early, making mistakes, learning on the fly, and eventually becoming a Calder Trophy finalist.
Leo Carlsson followed a different version of that same idea. After his draft year, there was speculation he’d return to Örebro in the SHL for 2023-24, but Anaheim instead built a workload plan that allowed him to play two games a week and strengthen his body on off days. The plan was disrupted by injury, but the model has been well regarded around the league, and Carlsson is now developing into one of the NHL’s next stars.
Quenneville said that thinking applies here, too.
“I would say there's some balance to that thought process, exactly like that,” he said.
The timing may soon force Anaheim’s hand. The Ducks beat both the Golden Knights and Panthers to start the year, and the next stop is a Wednesday matchup with the Edmonton Oilers in Anaheim. Edmonton has already been hit by injuries, with Ryan Nugent-Hopkins, Jason Dickinson, Mattias Janmark, and Matthew Savoie all on IR.
That could create a cleaner opening for Klepov than the first two games did. The Oilers are top-heavy up front, the Ducks will have last change, and Anaheim could use another body in the middle six or top nine behind Carlsson, Sennecke, and Cutter Gauthier, who have carried the team’s early offense.
At the same time, Quenneville has not exactly been eager to tinker with a winning lineup. And after Edmonton comes Winnipeg on Friday, then a home-and-home with Calgary.
If Klepov is still waiting by the time the Ducks are back in Anaheim on Saturday, Oct. 13, that would be a surprise. After that, the decision could come down to performance versus development.
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