Ducks Need New Script

Only the likes of “I Love Lucy” have been repeated as often as the type of show the Mighty Ducks put on Wednesday night.

They played hard. They even took an early lead. They withered and lost. Call it deja lose.

A 3-2 loss to the St. Louis Blues before an announced 9,374 at the two-third empty Arrowhead Pond was another in long line of encore performances by the Ducks. It was also their fifth consecutive loss, one shy of their season longest streak.

The results have been repetitive, only the circumstances change.

Wednesday, the Ducks managed to crawl back and tie the score, 2-2, on a Keith Carney goal early in the third period. That lasted four minutes, then Doug Weight set up behind the Duck net. He fed Cory Stillman, whose point-blank one-timer was in the net before goalie Jean-Sebastien Giguere could react.

Game. Set. Season.

Weight also had a goal, giving him 14 points in the last eight games. Offensive prowess that might make Duck Coach Bryan Murray salivate.

The Ducks had plenty of chances, especially early. Yet they had only two goals, the 15th time in the last 20 games they have scored two or fewer.

Blues goalie Brent Johnson survived an early onslaught, then made a back-breaker of a save in the third period, when he stopped one shot, then snagged Matt Cullen’s rebound flip as he fell to the ice.

So the Ducks were left with another A-for-effort from their coach.

“The guys have been great, think they have played hard,” Murray said. “Like some other teams in the league, we don’t score very easily. We’ve played hard and very disciplined for the most part.”

They did for one period Wednesday.

The Ducks owned the first period, even though they only had a 9-8 advantage in shots. But the Duck scoring chances were prime ones, starting when Marty McInnis hit the left post six minutes into the game.

Mike Leclerc had two good chances in close that Johnson managed to keep out of the net. A wide-open Oleg Tverdovsky had a shot stopped late in the period.

“That’s one of the best teams in the league, one that could make a run at the Stanley Cup,” the Ducks’ Jeff Friesen said. “For us to come out and have a period like that is a big lift. They are a great defensive team, so for us to get chances like that is nice.”

And they even managed to convert one, when they had a two-man advantage.

Keith Tkachuk went off for interference, when he slammed into defenseman Vitaly Vishnevski, who had just leveled Pavol Demitra. Chris Pronger was called for high sticking 28 seconds later.

The Ducks may have the third-worst power play in the NHL, but even they can be a handful on a five on three. Paul Kariya blasted a shot from the blue line that Johnson stopped. The rebound sat in the crease and Patric Kjellberg chipped in a shot for a 1-0 lead midway through the first period.

But not even Giguere, whose play has been exceptional in the last month, could make that stand.

Giguere had a 1.37 goals-against average and .949 save percentage in his previous 12 games. Yet he had a 4-6-2 record in that time, which reflects the black hole the Ducks find themselves in inside the opponents’ zone.

A scrap behind the Blues’ net resulted in a roughing penalty for Vishnevski and a double-minor roughing penalty for Scott Mellanby, putting the Ducks on the power play.

But Mike Eastwood beat Andy McDonald on the faceoff, slipped a pass to a wide open Dallas Drake, who beat Giguere to tie the score, 1-1, 12:21 into the second period.

The Ducks nearly got out of the period with a tie for a moral victory and a chance to regroup. But Weight skated into the Duck zone and, with defenseman Pavel Trnka hanging on his back, fired a backhander through a crowd and past Giguere with four-tenths of a second left in the period.