The 2000–01 Mighty Ducks of Anaheim season was the team's eighth season. The Mighty Ducks failed to qualify for the playoffs for the second year in a row and finished last in the West.
Offseason
After missing the 2000 playoffs by only four points, the Mighty Ducks were quite hopeful to return to the post season. Anaheim was very busy during the summer trading and acquiring a lot prospects and were active on the free agent market as well.
Trying to improve their scoring depth and not relying too much on Kariya and Selanne, the Mighty Ducks signed German Titov and acquired Andrej Nazarov who had a career year in goals (10) and points (31).
Other free agents were Dan Bylsma, Petr Tenkrat as well as Jim Cummins and Kevin Sawyer who were signed to provide the necessary protection for their star players since they lost Stu Grimson to the Kings as a free agent. The team became much more European-based making up half the roster, mainly on their defense (6).
Regular season
The season proved to be very tough as the team never found consistency. Things looked pretty good going 6-4-3-2 until November 4, when the team started having trouble coming back after being winless for five games twice in November, going 2-8-3-1 which lead the team to trade Traverse and Nazarov to the Boston Bruins for Samuel Pahlsson on November 18. To make matters even worse, Center Steve Rucchin was hit in the face by a shot on November 15, 2000 missing the rest of the season. Despite his absence the Ducks improved by mid December nearing the .500 mark by two games with a 5-3-0-0 record until December 17, 2000 but finishing the month 5-7-1-1. Anaheim fired head coach Craig Hartsburg on December 14, 2000 after winning against the Blue Jackets, replacing him with assistant coach Guy Charron though the move did not improve their performance. Despite this roller coaster ride the Mighty Ducks experienced, they were still in the playoff race with a 14-19-6-4 record by January 5, 2001. On January 10 the Mighty Ducks waived Dominic Roussel resulting in Giguere becoming their new backup, believing him and Hebert would carry the team into the playoffs and pass on the torch carefully to a new number one during the season.
But all those hopes were shattered as the Mighty Ducks lost sixteen games by March 2 going 4-16-2-1. During that stretch Hebert went 0-11-2 and losing his starting position by February much sooner to Giguere then expected. Though Hebert did not quite play as well as he did the last two seasons, much of this was based on the team not giving him the necessary support he needed as Selanne stated in an interview, expressing his frustrations and disappointment. Hebert faced thirty or more shots almost every game, yet was able to keep his save percentage close to the .900 mark.
Their longest winning streak was five games in early March 2001 when it was clear the team was not going to make the playoffs. During the winning streak Anaheim sent Teemu Selanne to the Sharks in exchange for Jeff Friesen and Steve Shields. Shields' acquisition ended Hebert's tenure with the Mighty Ducks getting waived and picked up by the New York Rangers on March 7 to replace the injured Mike Richter. A week later, Jason Marshall was traded to Washington on March 13. Shields never dressed for the Ducks that season due to an injury and the team called up Gregg Naumenko to serve behind J.-S. Giguere. Anaheim's GM Pierre Gauthier felt very confident and fans would accept the trade once the new arrivals dressed for their new team, calling both moves a huge change and necessary as the team needed to look forward and both players would improve the franchise immediately and long term as well. (SunJournal March 6, 2001)
While Selanne enjoyed much success with San Jose, the same could not be said about Anaheim as the Ducks went 2-6-3 after their five-game winning streak, which had fans and experts worried whether the deal with the Sharks was actually worth it. The Mighty Ducks went 11-22-5-1 in the second half with a lot of open questions about the team's future identity with longtime players Hebert, Marshall and Selanne gone.