The Ducks announced on Saturday morning that Greg Cronin will not return as head coach next season for what would have been the final year of his contract.

They posted a franchise-worst 50 regulation losses in Cronin’s first campaign (they had 47 the season prior), but improved by 21 points in the standings this season. They finished just below a .500 points percentage and as the second most-improved team in the NHL, though they still failed to qualify for the playoffs for a seventh consecutive time.

Cronin’s predecessor, Dallas Eakins, stayed aboard for all four seasons of his deal, despite the team’s performance getting progressively worse, and even some of his staff lingered when Cronin came aboard. Yet with clearer direction for the franchise, the OC Vibe complex opening next to Honda Center next year and the weight of six stagnant seasons vis-a-vis the bottom line, Cronin wasn’t afforded the same patience, despite trailing only Columbus’ Dean Evason in terms of year-over-year improvement.

“Greg was responsible, in many ways, for the improvement of this team, when we look at accountability, when we look at relevance,” general manager Pat Verbeek said via teleconference on Saturday afternoon.

Verbeek said that once his club was eliminated from playoff contention — in terms of this season’s goals, he said the team met or exceeded them, stating “we attained what we had looked to attain” — he began to inspect and evaluate its situation, leading him to believe “a different voice” was needed.

“In the end, it really wasn’t about wins and losses. When I talked about the concerns, some of those were things that could not be overcome with whatever measuring stick you wanted to apply to it,” Verbeek said. “With that, with my experience as a player and being a manager, I thought at this time it was the right time to make the change.”

So what were these insurmountable preoccupations? Verbeek was more forthcoming about what wasn’t an issue than what was.

He said the culture built by Cronin was one of responsibility and diligence, and that there “wasn’t any concern in that area.”

When asked if there was any influence from the dressing room or the owner’s box, Verbeek responded: “I wouldn’t say, necessarily, that any of those (parties) influenced me.”

The Ducks’ abjectly miserable special teams showings, particularly on the power play, could have been low-hanging fruit to justify the dismissal. But Cronin didn’t run either area and Verbeek said that he “didn’t look at that, there was other reasons.”

Young core players like Leo Carlsson, Mason McTavish and Cutter Gauthier all had painfully unproductive starts to the campaign, but by season’s end they were buoying the Ducks offensively. Along those lines, Verbeek rejected the idea that the club was behind the development curve in some way.

“The team is right on course, and we’re improving,” Verbeek said. “Sometimes you have to look at scenarios where a (new) voice is needed to push this group to another level. You look at the teams that are in the playoffs, we need 10 more wins, and that’s what we need to figure out for next season. So, I’m going to look for those answers with the new coach.”

Under the aegis of confidentiality, Verbeek declined to elaborate. Cronin, who was flabbergasted during the season when he was asked about his job security and similarly blindsided by his dismissal meeting with Verbeek, didn’t seem to walk away with a much clearer picture than Verbeek presented publicly.

“I would say he was completely shocked, which is probably normal from his perspective, and that’s why this was very difficult and probably didn’t make a lot of sense to him,” said Verbeek, adding that he’d like to revisit the discussion with Cronin down the line.

Cronin inherited a team that was absolutely lifeless after the 2022-23 season and in the midst of a hard pivot toward a youth movement with a stated willingness to sacrifice short-term success for long-term prosperity. Cronin, who was on the ground floor of the U.S. National Team Development Program in addition to excelling at the collegiate and minor league levels between his assistant coaching gigs in the NHL, developed a culture that was mainly designed to build up young players.

Finding resonance with both first-year pros and fully molded veterans can be challenging for any coach, and more so with the heft of losing year after year for longer-tenured veterans like Cam Fowler (who was traded to St. Louis) and John Gibson (who performed well when available but also displayed overt disinterest at times).

Verbeek said that while he was not closing the door on coaches of any experience level or background, he did want to find a stronger equilibrium between more and less seasoned players.

“We have a diverse roster in the sense that we’ve got some good older players and we’ve got some really good younger players,” he said. “With them being in different stages of their careers, it’s difficult in the sense that older players need less, younger players need more. (I have to) find a guy that can meld that development and that diverse roster into a cohesive unit.”

On the flip side, a coach firing always ramps up the pressure on management, and there was already a fair amount on Verbeek. He sold off pieces at both trade deadlines with Cronin behind the bench. While he made moves to reconfigure — out with Jamie Drysdale and in with Cutter Gauthier; goodbye Fowler and hello, Jacob Trouba — there has been practically nothing in the way of outright additions.

Last summer, Verbeek entered the free agency period with the second most cap space in the NHL. He did not sign a single player of note and in the trade market he added two veterans playing at the bottom of non-playoff lineups as cap-floor-clearing rentals. One was traded at the deadline and the other finished the season on injured reserve.

“I expect us to be very active and aggressive,” Verbeek said. “My expectation of this team is to make the playoffs next season; I expect our group to take a step. So I’m going to be active and progressive in making our team better.”