Oilers Prove Far Too Slick for Ducks

The momentum proved to be fleeting. The Western Conference finals merely ended as they began.

Now the Mighty Ducks are no more for this season and, in a sense, forever.

The flu-ravaged Edmonton Oilers went back to their formula of timely goals and the strong play of Dwayne Roloson in the net to advance to their first Stanley Cup final in 16 years with a 2-1 victory over the Ducks in Game 5 at the Arrowhead Pond.

It was a not-so-mighty ending to the Ducks’ season and an official end to an era as the “Mighty” part of the nickname with which they joined the NHL in 1993 will disappear. In the end, they were buried by a 3-0 deficit to start the series and couldn’t dig their way out.

“We kind of had a rough start and put ourselves in a pretty big hole,” forward Ryan Getzlaf said. “Obviously, we battled back a little bit but we didn’t get it done.”

The Oilers won the first two games of the series by identical 3-1 scores playing tight, crisp hockey. As the series shifted to Edmonton, they survived a wild third-period rally by the Ducks in Game 3, which proved key after a dismal Game 4 that delayed the Oilers’ celebration for two days.

The Ducks’ dominating 6-3 victory proved to be a wake-up call. The Oilers got back to what they did best in this series.

In a decisive second period, Ethan Moreau tied the score at the 3-minute 42-second mark with a second effort that he flipped over a fallen Jean-Sebastien Giguere after the goalie made the initial save on a wraparound try.

Less than five minutes later, a weakened Raffi Torres deftly redirected Marc-Andre Bergeron’s shot from the point to make the Ducks pay for their inability to clear the puck from their zone.

Torres, who sat out Games 2 and 3, was among those hit hardest by a team-wide stomach flu.

“Bergeron just kind of threw it at the net and it was going way wide to my right and he tipped it top-shelf glove on my left side,” said Giguere, who made 23 saves. “It was a real nice tip.

“That’s definitely one of their strengths. They know how to go to the net and they’re really good at tipping those pucks and creating a hard situation for a goalie.”

As the off-season arrives sooner than they wanted, the Ducks will feel ill about the many chances they missed to extend the series.

With an eight-day break entering the conference finals, they insisted they had the fresher legs against an Edmonton team that seemed to be gasping for breath entering its 11th playoff game in 21 days.

It looked that way in the first period Saturday when they outshot the Oilers, 14-8, but they could come away with only a power-play goal by Francois Beauchemin.

“We got one tonight but we couldn’t get it going after that,” Getzlaf said.

The final indictment will be their ailing power play that finished with three goals in 39 chances over five games, including a one-for-11 effort Saturday.

Four of those advantages came in the third period, including a five on three they gained late when defenseman Chris Pronger shot the puck into the crowd for a delay-of-game penalty. The Ducks pulled Giguere for an extra attacker but failed to get a solid chance on Roloson.

“You need your power play,” Scott Niedermayer said. “That third period was a pretty good example. A lot of credit goes to how they killed penalties. They did a good job and we didn’t rise up to the challenge.”

The best chance they had to tie the score came when Todd Marchant stole the puck from Bergeron in the Oilers’ end and fed a wide-open Rob Niedermayer. But the veteran forward hit the crossbar with his backhand shot.

“It’s tough but that’s kind of the way the series went,” Rob Niedermayer said. “Great chance. I just didn’t put it by him.”

In a season where they exceeded expectations with their surprising playoff run, the Ducks are left to think about a bright future with a core of skilled youngsters that’ll be led by Scott Niedermayer, their franchise player and Norris Trophy candidate.

“It’s going to be our responsibility as a coaching staff and as management to make sure that the bar is set even higher,” Coach Randy Carlyle said.

Others, like Giguere and impending free agents Teemu Selanne and Ruslan Salei, are left to wonder if this was their final game in a Duck uniform.

“This is the best team that I’ve ever played on,” said Giguere, the subject of trade rumors in the past. “This team is going in the right direction. What is going to happen with me, I don’t know. My heart wants to stay here but this is a business.”