Ducks Do the Wrong Thing at the Wrong Time

The final score sheet shows New York Islander center Derek Armstrong scored an unassisted goal at the 13:12 mark of the third period to account for the game-winner.

That’s inaccurate on two counts.

Armstrong didn’t do anything more to score than get hit in the chest with the puck. But that goal helped the Islanders to a 4-3 victory over the Mighty Ducks on Tuesday at Nassau Coliseum.

What’s more, Armstrong received a rather large assist from the disorganized Ducks. And a little dumb luck didn’t hurt either.

First, Duck winger Garry Valk couldn’t clear the puck out of the defensive zone. Then, Islander defenseman Doug Houda intercepted Valk’s pass at the right point and fired a shot that Duck goaltender Mikhail Shtalenkov stopped easily.

Handling it proved to be more difficult, however.

After the puck hit Shtaleknov, it popped into the air. Duck defenseman Dmitri Mironov, hoping to bat the puck toward the end boards and out of harm’s way, instead knocked it off Armstrong’s torso and into the net.

Since Armstrong was the closest Islander to the play, he was credited with the goal.

“We’ll take them any way we can get them,” Islander Coach Rick Bowness said.

The Ducks could have railed against the gods for delivering such an unfortunate bounce. They could have claimed they deserved better. They could have whined and cried.

But they knew better.

They didn’t play sound hockey.

They let a two-goal lead slip away and made far too many fundamental defensive mistakes to win. The Islanders, last in the Atlantic Division, pounced on every Duck blunder.

“The last two goals were just horrendous plays by a couple of people and it cost us the game,” Duck Coach Ron Wilson said.

Valk’s poor clearing pass that set up the game-winner was the biggest mistake, but there were others.

On New York’s third goal, Duck defenseman Bobby Dollas made a blind pass around the boards that went to Islander defenseman Kenny Jonsson on the left point.

Jonsson then slipped a cross-ice pass to Derek King at the right post and King scored for a 3-2 Islander lead 32 seconds into the third period.

“I went the other way with the puck and nobody was there,” Dollas said. “I was hoping for the winger to be there. The winger is supposed to stay on his wall. Everything got mixed up and that [a goal] is what happens.”

Joe Sacco’s goal on an end-to-end rush evened the score, 3-3, at the 4:17 mark. But instead of simplifying their game and perhaps playing for the tie, the Ducks went off the rails.

“Again we did a couple of stupid mistakes that cost us the game,” winger Teemu Selanne said. “This was a game we just blew away. We should play more simple. We shouldn’t take any chances. We shouldn’t play fancy.

“I thought we learned something from the Colorado game, but I guess we didn’t.”

By the 7:19 mark of the second period Tuesday, the Ducks had a 2-0 lead on goals by Jason Marshall and Paul Kariya.

Marshall’s goal was only his second in the NHL. His other came Feb. 1, 1992 as a member of the St. Louis Blues. Kariya scored his 23rd goal of the season on a two-on-none breakaway with Sacco.

By then it seemed the Ducks had seized control of the game, hurting the Islanders with their superior speed and solid goaltending from Shtalenkov. Shtalenkov started for the first time since Dec. 13 and played well in relief of Guy Hebert, whose franchise-record streak of 19 consecutive starts ended Tuesday.

But it took less than eight minutes for the Ducks to lose the momentum and the lead. Niklas Andersson scored a power-play goal at the 11:19 mark and Zigmund Palffy’s goal after another poor clearing pass enabled New York to tie the Ducks, 2-2, at 14:39.

“I thought Mikhail played a really good game for us and we let him down,” Dollas said.