Blues Rally Past Struggling Ducks

A night of frustration for the Mighty Ducks was seemingly put aside when Teemu Selanne scored on a power play with 1:16 remaining in regulation to tie the score and enhance their chances at gaining at least a point Wednesday night.

It only took 19 seconds for the St. Louis Blues to make it a thoroughly miserable night again.

Eric Brewer’s goal quickly took the steam out of a third-period comeback by the Ducks and gave the equally struggling Blues a 3-2 victory at the Savvis Center.

The Blues came into the game with one win in their first five games and played without star forward Keith Tkachuk. The Ducks now must try to salvage their three-game trip Friday in Detroit.

“It’s frustrating for sure,” Duck forward Rob Niedermayer said. “We came out with a good start and then they kind of came back and took the play to us. We’ve got to learn to play for 60 minutes and not have any letdowns.”

Their third-period letdown was brief and devastating. Brewer got the puck from Doug Weight in front of the blue line and flipped it toward the net where it deflected off the stick of Duck defenseman Ruslan Salei and floated past a stunned Ilya Bryzgalov.

“He shot the puck and I tried to gauge it,” Bryzgalov said. “It touched Rusty’s stick and went in over my glove.”

Bryzgalov was in the net because Jean-Sebastien Giguere came out late in the second period after straining a groin muscle while making a save.

Giguere said he doesn’t think the injury is serious and hopes to be available against the Red Wings.

Sandis Ozolinsh got the Ducks off to a good start in the first period when he put in a wrist shot, but their propensity to take bad penalties caught up with them in the second. Left wing Jonathan Hedstrom was whistled for holding and St. Louis took advantage on Christian Backman’s power-play goal.

The Blues added another on the power play when Dean McAmmond deflected Eric Weinrich’s shot from the point past Bryzgalov. It was the ninth power-play goal the Ducks have given up in the last four games.

“We keep finding ways to lose games instead of finding ways to win them,” Coach Randy Carlyle said. “Mentally, we’ve got to regroup as a team and understand that we’ve got to simplify things.”