Ducks Defeat Oilers in Overtime : Hockey: Anaheim wins on goal by Lebeau with 50 seconds left in the extra period.

The Mighty Ducks had three fresh faces in the lineup against Edmonton on Wednesday night. They’re a team that is getting younger and, if all goes according to plan, more skilled at the same time.

Denny Lambert, one of the new players, scored a goal, but so did the Ducks’ oldest player, Randy Ladouceur, as the Ducks defeated the Oilers, 4-3, in overtime in front of 17,174 at The Pond of Anaheim.

Stephan Lebeau scored the game-winner on a shot from the left wing with 50 seconds to play in the extra period.

The Ducks were 23.6 seconds away from winning in regulation before Shayne Corson fired a puck at the net that went in off the stick of defenseman Bobby Dollas.

Forward Mike Sillinger and defenseman Jason York played their first games for the Ducks after being acquired in the trade that sent popular enforcer Stu Grimson to Detroit on Tuesday.

But it was Lambert, a left wing who was called up from San Diego to add toughness and depth, who scored the Ducks’ first goal, the first of his NHL career after playing 277 games for the minor league San Diego Gulls.

Defenseman Milos Holan tried a point shot, Shaun Van Allen put the rebound off goalie Bill Ranford’s skate and Lambert jumped on the puck and put it in the net at 9:01 of the first period for a 1-0 lead.

Lambert has tried to shake a reputation for being merely a fighter, and he stayed in Anaheim last summer to work on his conditioning and agility. The work paid off. He had his typical 222 penalty minutes with the Gulls this season, but he also had 25 goals and 60 points.

“He’s a physical player but he’s got hands and hockey sense,” said Pierre Gauthier, the Ducks’ assistant general manager.

Ladouceur, 34, scored his second goal in a Duck uniform when he converted a rebound at 9:33 of the second. It was his first goal since Nov. 19, 1993 against Vancouver, a stretch of 89 games. But scoring isn’t part of Ladouceur’s job description. He is the team captain and a defensive anchor who makes up for aging legs by being in the right position. He’s been so steady a a stay-at-home defenseman over his career that he has played 853 NHL games despite rarely scoring a goal.

Duck goalie Mikhail Shtalenkov shut out Edmonton until 10:59 of the third, when Mike Stapleton scored on a deflection of a point shot.

The Ducks led, 3-1, after a goal by Bob Corkum, but David Oliver cut the lead to 3-2 at 14:44.

After a recent spate of trading veterans for younger players, the average age of the Ducks is now 26--young but not completely green--and there are only two players older than 30, Ladouceur and Tom Kurvers.

Sillinger and York add skill, and Sillinger in particular is supposed to add scoring punch.

“He worked his butt off (in Detroit), but because of their depth chart, he wasn’t going to get a lot of ice time,” Duck Coach Ron Wilson said. “Now he’s going to get a chance.”

Said Sillinger: “It’s like I’ve been drafted all over again.”

Wilson hopes the new start for a few players energizes the whole team.

“They’ve been wanting to play in the NHL and now they have the opportunity,” he said.