Flames Regain the Power

After their many sins in Game 2, the Mighty Ducks should have taken corrective measures for their penalty problems with a chance to take the lead in the Western Conference playoff series against the Calgary Flames.

Instead, their season-long inability to stay out of the box came with a price Tuesday night and the hard-nosed Flames tendered the bill.

Aided by the Ducks’ generosity, Calgary rode three power-play goals and a tightened defensive effort to a decisive 5-2 victory in Game 3 to take a 2-1 series lead at Arrowhead Pond and reclaim home-ice advantage.

The Flames got goals on the man advantage from Daymond Langkow, Kristian Huselius and Robyn Regehr, and Chuck Kobasew scored the eventual game-winner and McCarty added a key insurance goal in the third period.

Along the way, Calgary reverted to its recipe for success. Lots of hard hits, plenty of battles won along the boards and Miikka Kiprusoff returning to standout form in the net.

“What was great about that one tonight is that you can look at every guy in this room and they all had something to do with it,” Flame captain Jarome Iginla said. “Everyone won battles. Everyone made plays.

“The Ducks outskated us up in Calgary. We did that to them tonight.”

The low-scoring Flames scored five or more goals only seven times in the regular season. Much of that outburst came from their three-for-seven ratio with the extra attacker as they offset two power-play goals from Duck rookie Francois Beauchemin.

It was no contest in the net as Kiprusoff made 27 saves while Jean-Sebastien Giguere looked shaky again as he deals with an unspecified lower-body injury.

Kobasew broke a 2-2 tie in the second and goals by McCarty and Regehr broke open the game in the third. McCarty’s might as well have been on the power play, scoring as Jeff Friesen finished serving a high-sticking penalty.

“There were a lot of aspects to our game that weren’t very good tonight,” Duck center Todd Marchant said. “[Penalty killing] being one of them. We just made some mistakes in our own zone and as a result, they capitalized. It’s no secret to their formula for success.”

The Ducks now must recall their resilient ways in Game 4 Thursday to stay in the series.

“They came out and battled the whole game,” captain Scott Niedermayer said. “They got what they deserved and we got what we deserved. We’ve got to move forward and we have another chance in two days to be a lot better than that.”

Giguere didn’t look any better than his erratic effort in Sunday’s win after missing Game 1. Neither did his team in its own zone.

Left wing Chris Simon went right past Duck rookie Ryan Getzlaf with a full head of steam and centered a pass from behind the net to Kobasew, who one-timed it into the net for one of the two even-strength goals.

The Flames rode their lead into the third period and built on it. McCarty, the Game 1 star, got his second of the series when he was left alone to wrap a shot around Giguere, who made only 19 saves on 24 shots.

“To win Game 3, we just sort of put things back to where we felt they should be after two games at home,” McCarty said.

Meanwhile, Kiprusoff managed to survive after nearly getting his head taken off in the first period. Beauchemin lined up a blistering shot that the goalie barely got a glove on but the force of the shot knocked his mask off.

He didn’t see Beauchemin’s next shot as it blew past him through traffic at the 17:26 mark of the first, ending the Ducks’ drought on the power play in the series. They had gone without one in their first 12 attempts.

But the special-teams goal was merely the theme of the first two periods.

With forward Joffrey Lupul in the box for slashing in the opening minute of the second period, the Ducks failed to clear their zone and Huselius banged in a rebound for his second goal of the series.

Beauchemin again pulled his team even with another blur of a shot that roared past Kiprusoff on the glove side for another power-play goal.

But Kiprusoff also had his big moments. He stopped Andy McDonald on a rare offensive rush in the second and robbed him again with a point-blank stop in the third with the Ducks on a power play.