Kings’ Ferraro Still Ruffling Some Feathers

Ray Ferraro, who had broken some Orange County hearts the night before, sent flowers Friday night and also settled things for some confused travel agents.

Ferraro’s first-period goal sent the Kings to a 2-0 victory over San Jose, which completed the Western Conference playoff picture.

Anaheim Mighty Ducks, get ready to head to Detroit as the sixth-place team in the West.

Seventh-place Sharks, your mission, impossible though it might sound, involves going to Colorado.

And the Kings head into their season finale Sunday on a three-game winning streak. And then they head home.

The last time they won three in a row, the Kings were still part of the playoff picture. Not so anymore.

Ferraro had scored twice in the Kings’ 4-3 overtime win over the Ducks Thursday night, and his second goal won the game.

It also moved him to say, “When you’re playing a team that needs points that badly, it’s kind of fun to put the screws to them.”

Ferraro now says his talk of retirement at the beginning of the season was premature.

“I want to play again,” he said. “I feel I can contribute.”

Things were unscrewed Friday night in the first period when Vladimir Tsyplakov stripped Jeff Friesen of the puck and slipped it to Ferraro, who slipped it past Mike Vernon for a 1-0 lead.

Only 17 seconds had elapsed.

The lead became 2-0 on Rob Blake’s power-play goal 4:08 later.

Vernon, shaky early on in his bid to become the Shark goalie for their playoff run, settled down from there but could cast envious eyes at the other end of the ice, where Stephane Fiset was performing flawlessly.

Fiset, who had 32 saves, turned back a point-blank effort by San Jose’s Owen Nolan in the third period and had gotten a little help from the post on Patrick Marleau’s show on a two-man breakaway a period earlier.

He was alternately helped and hurt by a defense that played well against Shark attackers time after time, but also surrendered 32 shots. And Fiset was also helped by a Shark attack that had more turnovers than a bad high school basketball team.

In the end, the Kings won their third game in a row for the first time since March 9-15, and also won for the fourth time in their last five games.

And the Ducks learned that tonight’s game against San Jose is for exercise.