Ducks Win First on Road as Yake Scores Three Goals

What took the Ottawa Senators 40 games and six months, the Mighty Ducks accomplished in one night.

The Senators dragged into April last season without a victory on the road.

The Ducks stepped onto the ice at Madison Square Garden for their first road game Tuesday night and left a few hours later with a 4-2 victory over the New York Rangers, skating off triumphantly as the last stragglers of a crowd of 17,643 booed the home team.

The Ducks did it behind Terry Yake’s first NHL hat trick and a 40-save performance by goaltender Guy Hebert, whose effort left him partially dehydrated by the end of the game. Nevertheless, Hebert came up with 17 third-period saves.

“You don’t want to come in here and get spanked because it’s a very long road trip,” said Coach Ron Wilson, whose team is 2-2-2 with a four-game unbeaten streak. “This makes it easy to relax and not think, ‘We’ve got to get a win on the road.’ . . . It can snowball, and get you down so you start looking for excuses, like our travel’s hard, our schedule’s not fair. We’re fine. We just killed that.

“Here we are in New York against a team I’ve read many people consider to be a leading contender for the Stanley Cup, and we come in and win. It was not luckily either. This wasn’t a matter of just hanging on.”

The Ducks led, 2-0 and 3-1, and were ahead by two goals for the final six minutes.

None of the five recent expansion teams have done what the Ducks did Tuesday.

Florida, the other new team this year, tied Chicago in its first road game and beat Tampa Bay in its third. Tampa Bay won in its third road game last season, and San Jose needed 15 two years ago. Ottawa set the example that made other expansion teams cringe.

“I don’t even want to talk about that,” Yake said, laughing. “That was something we sure didn’t want to think about. We wanted to win Game 1 and if we didn’t, we wanted to win Game 2.”

Yake’s third goal, scored from short range during a power play, gave the Ducks a 4-2 lead at 13:39 of the third period.

“The last goal he roofed in tight. That was a goal-scorer’s goal,” Wilson said. “He feels pressure to be our goal-scorer. Now he’s really broken the ice, maybe more is to come.”

Yake’s first two goals were things of beauty, both on open-ice backhanders that beat Ranger goalie Mike Richter.

“I used the same move both times,” Yake said. “I knew if there was another time, I’d have to use Plan B, but it never came.”

On the first, assisted by Bob Corkum and Bill Houlder, Yake controlled the puck even though a Ranger was hung all over him. On the second, off a pass from Anatoli Semenov, he paid the price when he was crunched in the crease after scoring.

His hat trick--the first for the Mighty Ducks--came with former Hartford General Manager Brian Burke in the stands. Burke, now a senior vice president with the NHL and Commissioner Gary Bettman’s right-hand man, took it graciously. He was the one who made the decision to expose Yake to the expansion draft in June after a 22-goal season.

“One of our scouts said then he could be the Brian Bradley of this year’s draft,” said Burke, referring to Tampa Bay’s 42-goal scorer last year.

Said Yake, beaming: “I’m kind of happy he’s here. I’d like to go out and shake his hand right now.”

Duck Notes

Right wing Todd Ewen did not return after suffering a broken nose and a slight concussion in the first period. . . . Defenseman Bobby Dollas, who sprained his left thumb late in training camp, made his season debut. . . . Center Shaun Van Allen had two stitches under his nose after being cut with a stick late in the game.