Ducks Lose but Kariya Gains : Hockey: Rookie earns goal and assist in special game before parents and siblings despite 5-3 loss at Vancouver.

Paul Kariya has won an NCAA championship, an Olympic silver medal and gold for Canada at the World Championships, but his family wasn’t there to see any of it, except by satellite.

His parents and four brothers and sisters hadn’t watched him in person since he played junior hockey until Saturday, when he made his hometown debut in the Mighty Ducks’ 5-3 loss to Vancouver at Pacific Coliseum.

Kariya, 20, had a goal and an assist, giving the rookie five points in his last three games. Despite only recently emerging from a lull, he has 16 points in his first 22 NHL games. Kariya’s parents couldn’t be more supportive, they just don’t believe in treating any of their five children differently, even if one makes more than $2 million a year.

“No one child is more important than the others,” Kariya said. “For them to take off to see me play and leave four other kids behind who need driving here and there, that’s not the way I was brought up. I’ve been brought up never having special attention from Day 1.”

Kariya’s goal at 16:13 of the third, his eighth of the season, cut the Canucks’ lead to 4-3, but Martin Gelinas scored an empty-net goal with 26 seconds remaining after the Ducks pulled goalie Guy Hebert for an extra attacker.

A Duck defenseman suffered a wrist injury during the first period, but not the player the Kings would expect.

It was Tom Kurvers, who sprained his left wrist.

David Karpa, rejected by the Kings as unfit to play last week because he needs wrist surgery, made his debut as a Duck three days after they acquired him for a draft pick. The NHL voided the Kings’ trade after the team said Karpa needed surgery before he could play and told him his back is “a walking time bomb.”

But the Ducks decided differently, and for now they are right. Duck Coach Ron Wilson inserted him into the lineup because Randy Ladouceur has a slight injury to his left foot, and Karpa played physically with no evidence of favoring the wrist. Karpa says he feels fine now.

Vancouver scored the first three goals, but the Ducks trimmed the lead to 3-2 after two periods and Gelinas made it 4-2 in the third with his first of two goals.

Garry Valk, the Ducks’ third-leading scorer last season, finally got his first goal of the season, and Kariya assisted Peter Douris with 23 seconds left in the second period by threading a cross-ice pass to him after coming across the blue line along the left wing.

Vancouver’s Trevor Linden and Josef Beranek each scored their 10th goals of the season, and Greg Adams scored a shorthanded goal on a two-on-one rush with Pavel Bure after Bure got around Bobby Dollas in the Ducks’ attacking zone.

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Duck Notes

Right wing Todd Ewen has been a healthy scratch the past three games. “I have to do what’s best for the team, which is, I guess, sit up here,” Ewen said. “Of course it’s not very appealing to me, but if (Coach Ron Wilson) wants to go with a little more scoring, that’s his prerogative.” . . . Defenseman Milos Holan, acquired from Philadelphia Wednesday for Anatoli Semenov, is expected to make his debut against Calgary on Wednesday.