Meet the new guys.

"I never really looked at them as struggling every time I checked," he said of the Ducks. "It looked like they were OK, but now it's kind of, 'we have to get going here,' make sure we get to the playoffs. It never seemed like they were struggling by any means."

Brookbank and enforcer Mike Brown, acquired from the Vancouver Canucks on Wednesday, took part in their first workout at Honda Center with their new teammates on Sunday. Both were riding the end of their respective teams' bench and welcomed the fresh start - even if it meant little sleep on the way in.

"I came in, found out around 10 o'clock eastern time - I was in New Jersey - packed up some of my stuff. I had to get up at like 5:30 in the morning to go to the airport, flew out of Jersey and met the team in Minnesota," Brookbank recalled. "I didn't get a lot of sleep that night. My mind was kind of racing a bit. Got in there in Minnesota and got into the game."

Said Brown, "I went from Vancouver, left at 10:45 at night, going to Toronto at 6 in the morning. Left at 8:30 in the morning, got into Nashville at 9:30, so maybe a couple hours of sleep on the plane - if that. But I had a pretty good pregame nap and rested up for the game. I was playing off adrenaline. It was exciting. Too bad we didn't win, but I got my first win in the last game (at Calgary)."

Brookbank was thrust into an important role on the Ducks' blue line, paired with Chris Pronger and playing 16, 17 and 14 minutes respectively during a three-game trip to Minnesota, Nashville and Calgary. He figured to get more minutes following Sunday's announcement that rookie defenseman Brendan Mikkelson was heading back to AHL affiliate Iowa. 

From 2003-05 Brookbank was in the Mighty Ducks' system, attending training camp under Mike Babcock, rooming with Chris Kunitz in Cincinnati and forming enough memories with Ryan Getzlaf to resurrect an old joke when the two passed each other in the dressing room Sunday.

It's a different team now, not just in name, as Brookbank quickly found out.

"Especially when we lost the first two on that road trip, you could tell they were like, 'losing is not an option' for the last game," he said. "They have a lot of veterans who know how to play the game."

As for his new partner, Brookbank said "you couldn't ask for anything better than that. He's a pretty easy guy to play with, really good with the puck. He's Chris Pronger. You don't really need to say much more. I'm happy to be with him, hopefully we can get something going."

Brown sounded almost pridefully blunt about his job on the ice: "I'm obviously an energy player, a guy that's going to get in everyone's face all the time, get under guys' skin and play a physical game."

He is less familiar with his new teammates than Brookbank, though he did play with Brendan Morrison for a season in Vancouver, and with Andrew Ebbett for two seasons at the University of Michigan. His outsider's impression of the Ducks?

"I wasn't paying too much attention to this team when I was in Vancouver, but every time I played against this team, they were tough to play against. Everybody seemed to be standing up for each other, and everybody has the same thing in mind. I know what the team's all about and the team philosophy, so I should fit pretty well here."