Ducks Are Not So Mighty Against Sharks : Hockey: They are 0-5 against San Jose after latest loss, 5-2. Troubles at home continue.

Say this for the Mighty Ducks: They haven’t been swept by the San Jose Sharks--yet.

The Ducks are merely 0-5 against the Sharks. After a 5-2 loss Wednesday night, they have one more chance to avoid being blanked in the six-game season series.

The Sharks have won only 13 times all season--only eight times against teams other than the Ducks.

The Ducks turned in one their uglier performances of the season, yet did it in front of another sellout crowd of 17,174--the fourth Anaheim Arena sellout in a row.

All those ticket-buyers must be feeling as if they’re being duped by now. They get reports of an exciting, successful team in the road games, then pay their money to watch an anemic, mistake-prone one at Anaheim Arena, where the Ducks are 4-14-2. The home crowd hasn’t seen the Ducks win in a month, since an overtime victory over St. Louis Dec. 12.

How to turn it around?

“Maybe reverse sweater night? I don’t know,” Coach Ron Wilson said. “I really don’t know what to say. The players are having a meeting right now. Ask the players, I’m going to ask the players myself tomorrow why we don’t play with the same intensity at home. Maybe it’s the weather, the palm trees. I want to hear what their excuses are because I’m sure they have a number of them.

Said right wing Terry Yake: “The bottom line is it’s got to come from inside. I don’t care what you wear, what you eat, where you sleep.”

Johan Garpenlov and Sergei Makarov each had two goals, and Igor Larionov and Makarov had four points each.

The Ducks’ success has been built on defense and goaltending, and both were off Wednesday. Wilson said the best defenseman was Don McSween, who arrived only Tuesday from minor league San Diego.

One of the Ducks’ most steadfast qualities this season has been the goaltending of Guy Hebert and Ron Tugnutt, but for the second consecutive game, the goaltending was shaky.

Hebert entered the game with a 2.74 goals-against average, but left in the second period after giving up a goal in the first and three in the first 6:28 of the second.

Those 6 1/2 minutes were his undoing. At 1:25 of the second, Makarov picked up the puck in the neutral zone than skated in and scored with a rising shot that skipped off Hebert’s left shoulder and into the net for a 2-0 lead.

The Ducks scored a power-play goal at 3:08 on defenseman Bill Houlder’s shot from the left circle with Jaroslav Otevrel off for hooking.

Larionov scored the Sharks’ second goal of the second period at 4:03, when he eluded defenseman David Williams’ stick, then threw a shot at Hebert that actually landed in the crease and then bounced in. Larionov appeared to be laughing at his good fortune as he headed back to the bench.

Hebert’s last act was to watch Johan Garpenlov score his second goal of the game after waltzing into the crease alone, gliding and cutting and finally putting the fourth puck of the night past Hebert.

Wilson took the opportunity to send in Tugnutt, who wasn’t very sharp himself in Monday’s 6-4 loss to Detroit.

Less than 2 1/2 minutes later, Tugnutt fell victim too, when Makarov’s shot from behind the goal line went in off the back of Tugnutt’s stick. Larionov, too, seemed amused at his luck. The goal came with the Sharks holding a two-man advantage with Stu Grimson in the box for slashing and Alexei Kasatonov beside him for boarding.

Duck Notes

Don McSween, the San Diego Gull defenseman who was given a tryout Tuesday, signed a one-year contract and played in Wednesday’s game. With defensemen Randy Ladouceur (bruised right thigh) and Sean Hill (sprained left shoulder) out, McSween was needed to give the Ducks a sixth defenseman. Myles O’Connor has been on personal leave and was assigned to San Diego for conditioning. Another Gull defenseman who has played two games for the Ducks, Anatoli Fedotov, was unable to join Anaheim because of a recent injury.