Unbeaten, but Not Unblemished

They just had to make it interesting, didn’t they?

The Mighty Ducks’ 4-3 victory over the top-seeded Dallas Stars 48 seconds into the fifth overtime was another twist to an improbable playoff march in which they are the only unbeaten team still vying for Lord Stanley’s Cup.

Digest that. The Ducks, seeded seventh in the West, are leading their second-round series while the Detroit Red Wings and Colorado Avalanche are on vacation.

“There’s no pressure on us, and we have a great opportunity here,” said Duck defenseman Keith Carney, who played a team-high 56 minutes 20 seconds -- nearly the equivalent of a regulation game. “We just want to keep it going.”

And going. And going.

“It’s only the first game,” said Petr Sykora, who stunned the remaining fans at American Airlines Center when he rifled a wrist shot past the stick of Dallas goalie Marty Turco at 12:32 a.m. Central Time. “I’m sure it’s going to be long and it’s going to be a battle. This is the way we play.”

The Ducks had every reason to lose this game, the longest ever played by either team and fourth-longest in NHL history, but won it because of their seemingly endless resolve.

“Everybody on the coaching staff did a great job to keep us focused on the bench and in the locker room,” Sykora said.

That focus remained strong through several flirtations with adversity. If their first-round sweep of the Red Wings was stunning, their victory Thursday was equally remarkable, given the number of times it almost slipped through their tired fingers.

They had built a two-goal lead in the second period and couldn’t hold it. They’d clung to a one-goal lead entering the final minutes of regulation time and squandered that, too.

And this was a tougher test than the one they’d faced against the Red Wings, so this victory was born of different factors.

They prevailed over the Red Wings because Jean-Sebastien Giguere’s goaltending was impeccable and because they played near-perfect defense. They got opportunistic goals and a handful of breaks. The Red Wings got no breaks until a bad bounce enabled them to take Game 4 to overtime, which merely prolonged the Ducks’ victory and celebrations.

Giguere on Thursday played with more tenacity than textbook form, often forced to scramble to see the puck through the swirling mass of bodies around his net. Also, the breaks went against the Ducks Thursday, most notably with the nullification of the apparent winner at 14:41 of the third overtime after video replay officials ruled that the net had come off its moorings before Steve Thomas deflected a shot by Steve Rucchin past Turco.

“We responded great to that,” Sykora said. “We really stuck to our game plan.”

Their game plan evidently includes making things tough on themselves.

The Ducks have reached this point without benefit of a power-play goal or a single hot scorer. Those failings could be laughed off after they defeated Detroit and cited as evidence they were so solid defensively and balanced offensively they didn’t need to ride one player or depend on power plays to win.

Those failings nearly caught up with them Thursday. It doesn’t matter that their second goal was a short-handed score by Rob Niedermayer, a splendid individual effort made possible when he poked the puck through the legs of Dallas defenseman Sergei Zubov and beat Turco low to the goalie’s stick side at 4:04 of the second period.

It matters that they failed to cash in on a five-on-three advantage that began late in the first period and carried over to the second, a prime opportunity for them to build an impregnable lead and take the Stars and the crowd out of the game. A lead of three or more goals might have been enough to win while they were still young.

“We need to score on those opportunities,” Carney said. “A lot of things went against us. They got a couple of fortunate bounces. They were getting breaks and we just continued to play.”

There was an almost palpable feeling that it was a matter of when, not if, the Stars would pull even in the third period, and they did so with 2:47 left, when Brenden Morrow redirected a blast from the point by Stephane Robidas above Giguere’s outstretched glove. The Stars outshot the Ducks, 40-27, in the overtimes.

Not that the Ducks expected this to be easy. The Stars are bigger and more physical than the Red Wings, more willing to grind and battle for the puck along the boards and in the corners. The Red Wings relied heavily -- probably too heavily -- on finesse. The Stars can play that style, too, but the gritty element to their game gives them an advantage the Red Wings didn’t have.

“Jiggy has kept us in it and given us an opportunity to win,” Thomas said. “I can’t say enough about him.”

Duck Coach Mike Babcock had said an overtime loss in their first game against Detroit would have been more demoralizing to them than to the playoff-tested Red Wings. As it turned out, they won that game and didn’t have to take so early a measure of their mettle.

They passed another test Thursday, this by the skin of whatever teeth they have left. “We’ve been opportunistic,” Thomas said, “and we’ve got to try to keep it going.”

As long as it takes, apparently.

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Bonus Panels

*--* Longest NHL overtime games: DATE CITY RND SCORE SCORER OT TIME 3-24-36 Montreal SF Detroit 1, Mud Bruneteau 116:30 Montreal Maroons 0 4-3-33 Toronto SF Toronto 1, Ken Doraty 104:46 Boston 0 5-4-00 Pittsburgh CSF Philadelphia Keith Primeau 92:01 2, Pittsburgh 1 4-24-03 Dallas CSF Ducks 4, Petr Sykora 80:48 Dallas 3 4-24-96 Washington CQF Pittsburgh 3, Petr Nedved 79:15 Washington 2 3-23-43 Detroit SF Toronto 3, Jack McLean 70:18 Detroit 2 3-28-30 Montreal SF Montreal 2, Gus Rivers 68:52 N.Y. Rangers 1 4-18-87 Washington DSF N.Y. Pat LaFontaine 68:47 Islanders 3, Washington 2 4-27-94 Buffalo CQF Buffalo 1, Dave Hannan 65:43 New Jersey 0 3-27-51 Detroit SF Montreal 3, Maurice Richard 61:09 Detroit 2

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