Ducks Fail to Power Up at Key Time

Their goaltender has been otherworldly, drawing favorable comparisons to a young Patrick Roy. Their defensive pressure has been suffocating, offering slim pickings. Their late-night timing has been impeccable, with four nerve-racking overtime victories is as many tries.

But there had been something missing during the Mighty Ducks’ improbable run through the Stanley Cup playoffs.

The Ducks got one power-play goal in Game 3 of their second-round Western Conference playoff series Monday against the Dallas Stars at the Arrowhead Pond, but they needed more.

They needed a power-play goal to get even with the Stars late in the game. They had their chance, down by a goal and with Dallas defenseman Sergei Zubov in the penalty box for hooking Paul Kariya with 6:16 to play.

What the Ducks got was more pain and suffering from their sputtering power play, clicking after seven playoff games at a paltry 7.4% success rate (two of 27). They failed to record a shot on Marty Turco’s net, chasing the puck out of their own end of the ice far too often to establish anything resembling sustained pressure in the Stars’ end.

A 2-1 Dallas lead held up for a good many reasons, chief among them the Ducks’ inability to score more often than once in four tries with the man-advantage.

Steve Rucchin’s power-play goal at the 16:09 mark of the first period was all the Ducks could get past Turco, and that involved a fortunate ricochet off the left skate of Dallas defenseman Richard Matvichuk.

“Actually, we’ve been better in this series, much better than against Detroit,” Kariya said, referring to the Ducks’ 0-for-18 slump with the man-advantage while sweeping the defending Stanley Cup champions from the first round. “We still have a long ways to go before we’re a threat on every power play.”

Asked about their pivotal third-period opportunity that went nowhere, Kariya said, “We never got it set up and had a little trouble on our breakouts and that was the end of it. You always have to give credit to the other team. They’ve got a lot of good defensemen, who have a lot of playoff experience.

“Still, you have to expect to score on your power play.”

Indeed, many would say that a team with a potential first unit of Kariya, Rucchin, Adam Oates, Petr Sykora and Sandis Ozolinsh couldn’t help but create havoc while on the man-advantage.

Remarkably enough, the Ducks have been anything but effective since acquiring Ozolinsh in a Jan. 30 trade with the Florida Panthers that was designed to improve a power play that on Feb. 4 was fifth overall in the NHL with a 19.3% success rate (43 of 223).

In fact, Ozolinsh has played himself off the top unit, which Monday featured Kariya, Rucchin and Oates up front with Sykora and defenseman Niclas Havelid at the points. At one point during a first-period power play, Coach Mike Babcock had Keith Carney and Ruslan Salei, two grinders, manning the points.

“We had an opportunity to tie the game,” Babcock said when asked about the third-period power play that fizzled.

“Obviously, that’s disappointing [that the Ducks failed to score]. We got one power play, bang, it’s in the net right away. We had another and we had good puck control, but we didn’t attack the net. [In the third], we needed one and didn’t get a goal.”