As he sprints down the corridor of the American Airlines Center’s bowels, Beckett Sennecke’s ball cap flies off his head. The 19-year-old curses softly under his breath as he bends down to pick up his headwear. Upon resuming his course, he realizes that his guide to the team bus, teammate Nikita Nesterenko, has deserted him. Fortunately, the Ducks' broadcast crew is just around the corner to help lead young Sennecke to his destination.
It’s far from the first rookie moment that Sennecke has had this season as he continues to navigate the NHL, both on and off the ice. On the ice, he’s taken the league by storm, currently second in the NHL in rookie scoring and tied for first in rookie goalscoring.
Off the ice, he’s now living on his own in a house, which is habitually visited by housemate Sam Colangelo, who is currently in the AHL with the San Diego Gulls. Sennecke doesn’t have a car just yet (it’s on the way), so he has a rotation of teammates whom he plays passenger princess for when he needs a ride to practices or games.
Sennecke is the youngest player on the Ducks, but he’s accompanied by a cohort of teammates in the same age range as him. He began the season on a line with 21-year-old Cutter Gauthier and 22-year-old Mason McTavish, and has since been shifted to a line with Gauthier and 20-year-old Leo Carlsson. Sennecke is rooming with Carlsson on road trips.
“It’s good, can’t complain,” Sennecke said. “He doesn’t snore.”
“It’s been fun,” Carlsson said. “Great guy. Kind of similar, but (also) not really. It works out fine. He doesn’t disturb me at all, I don’t disturb him. But we talk a lot, too, so it’s been good.”
Carlsson said that the two of them don’t talk about hockey very much in their room and Sennecke couldn’t contain his laughter when asked about what they talk about instead.
“We’re young,” Sennecke said. “Typical kid stuff, I guess. Sports. Not too much about hockey, honestly.”
Though Sennecke isn’t yet old enough to legally drink in the country that he plays in, he’s been playing a grown man’s game. A somewhat unimpressive rookie faceoff showing, followed by a vanilla performance in preseason, posed the question of whether Sennecke was ready for full-time NHL duty. But he quickly silenced those doubts with a goal in his NHL debut and a multi-point outing in his second game.
“He did a lot of good things out there today,” Ducks head coach Joel Quenneville said following Sennecke’s debut. “I think he had the puck a lot. Strong in the puck areas and sustained some possession. I still think there’s some good things that he’s going to bring to our team game. We can use him in a lot of different ways and different areas as the game progresses. It was a good start for him.”
There’s been growing pains, for sure. Every so often, Sennecke will try a move that works in juniors, but gets snuffed out in the NHL. Take his turnover against the Dallas Stars, which led to a goal against. At the end of a shift, Sennecke attempted to dangle his way past defenseman Miro Heiskanen instead of getting the puck deep. Heiskanen swatted the puck away with ease, with Tyler Seguin eventually receiving an outlet pass and scoring to give the Stars a 3-2 lead.
Sennecke missed a few shifts and was even demoted to the third line briefly, but he was returned to his usual line later in the game, helping set up two goals in a 7-5 win.
“Draws the power play, makes a huge play on that power play,” Chris Kreider said after that game. “Apologized to the group, and then went out and got one for us. Instrumental in getting one for us. That’s super mature of him. Kudos to him for doing that, that was awesome to see.”
“I know that that's kind of a tough play to make, especially in that time in the game,” Sennecke said. “(The coaching staff) basically told me that ‘We know that you know.’ Missed a couple of shifts there. I'm glad I had their trust to put me back out there in the third.”
The flip side of Sennecke attempting moves that may cause Quenneville to pull out his remaining hair is that when those moves do pop, they have helped set up optimal scoring chances. A neat series of dekes to avoid pressure from both Brett Howden and Shea Theodore during Saturday’s game against the Vegas Golden Knights almost led to the overtime winner.
Sennecke with an absolutely ridiculous move outnumbered at the blue line. Couldn’t finish the sequence, but what a play. #FlyTogetherpic.twitter.com/VqictCif04
— Aren Dakessian (@agdakessian) November 23, 2025
Sennecke has also been a forechecking force and is improving his work around the boards. Areas where he was often dumped to the ice or shoved aside without much pushback are becoming spots where he is muscling off defenders and sticking with plays.
“I think that his overall game is getting more consistent as far as how we play in our own end,” Quenneville said. “Positionally aware, how you use your stick, how you get in shooting lanes. The offensive side of things, he’s got it, so get out of the way and let him go.”
The Ducks’ overtime win on Nov. 17 was capped off by Sennecke freezing all three Utah Mammoth skaters—and goaltender Karel Vejmelka—before sliding a pass to a wide-open Olen Zellweger for the game-winning tally.
“That was great patience on that play, great play recognition,” Quenneville said. “He had the goalie coming out, two guys coming at him down the barrel. He sees the play, you’re sitting there just looking at the goalie and you’re thinking, ‘I’ve got to shoot this thing.’ Then, he has the presence of mind of making a beautiful pass, and (it) ended in a nice play.”
“(He has) a ton of skill,” Kreider said. “Speed, confidence, desire to make plays. Desire to get better and have an impact. Off the ice, pretty goofy kid, fun to be around. Enjoys coming to the rink. He definitely brings a lot of energy.”
“I think he's just getting better and better,” Frank Vatrano said. “Playing in this league at 19 is no easy task, and I know he's got the swagger and the confidence to do it. For him, just keep growing and just keep taking it day by day. You can't look too far. There’s going to be ups and downs throughout the season, but now we’ve got a good group in here and we're here to help the young guys out in any possible way.”
While there were expectations that Sennecke could be on a load management plan this season, similar to what Carlsson went through during his rookie season, Ducks general manager Pat Verbeek revealed on Ducks Stream that Sennecke’s testing was more advanced than expected and that his ‘modified’ load management plan setup does not force him to miss any games.
“He’ll tell us how that's all going to play out,” Quenneville said. He’s a big kid, he's a strong kid. We'll see how he handles it. I don't know how much ice time on a game-to-game basis, I'd say he's gonna be (at) the numbers he's playing at right now. I think we're probably playing our top guys offensively a little bit more in those games. Every game's different, but I don't expect him (to be) playing close to 19 minutes on a game-to-game basis. But, we'll see. He'll tell us.”
“You can kind of watch, especially what the older more experienced guys do out there,” Sennecke said regarding taking care of his body during a compact schedule with plenty of travel. “You can pick up little things by just watching.”
“The travel's long, being in a hotel so much. It's kind of something that you're not quite used to, because most times in the OHL, you bus back the day of. But, they’re nice hotels, it's not too tough.”
Several Ducks veterans were queried about which players they learned from when they were first coming into the league, like Sennecke now. Names like Martin St. Louis, Vincent Lecavalier, Sami Salo, Ryan McDonagh, Brad Richards, Patrice Bergeron, Brad Marchand and Zdeno Chára were produced.
While perhaps there isn’t a veteran with that caliber of resumé on the team, there are still plenty of valuable resources that Sennecke can pull from on this Ducks team. There’s also a wealth of knowledge on the coaching staff, which contains three former head coaches behind Quenneville himself.
After every Ducks home goal, their goal song, ‘Coming For You’ by The Offspring, blares from the Honda Center speakers. It’s then followed by a goal song personally chosen by the player who scored. When Sennecke scored on Nov. 2 against the New Jersey Devils, Sabrina Carpenter’s ‘Manchild’ emitted. This wasn’t Sennecke’s doing. He hadn’t even chosen a goal song. But now it’s his, and it perfectly encapsulates the Gumby-esque teenager with the voice that sounds like it’s been modulated.
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