Veterans step forward for Ducks

The meeting might or might not have been necessary in their view, but the veteran players on the Ducks were issued a challenge by Coach Randy Carlyle to lead them out of a funk that has lasted two months.

Leave it to Scott Niedermayer and Chris Pronger, the team’s two highest-paid players and their bedrock on defense, to take the initiative Sunday night.

Niedermayer broke a third-period tie with 3 minutes 23 seconds remaining and Pronger followed 48 seconds later with a power-play goal to put the finishing touch on a 5-3 victory over the Colorado Avalanche in front of an announced sellout crowd of 17,174 at the Honda Center.

The victory was crucial for the Ducks (36-17-10) as they ended a three-game losing streak ahead of a Pacific Division showdown tonight in San Jose against the Sharks, who are five points behind the Ducks and in a second-place tie with Dallas.

“The standings are getting pretty tight,” Niedermayer said. “Especially coming off the game we just played in Dallas, [in] which we weren’t very good. It was important to come out and play a lot better. I think we did for the most part.”

The Ducks also got two goals and an assist from Andy McDonald. Teemu Selanne gave them a 3-2 lead near the end of the second period with his 37th goal.

But they weren’t without their mistakes, which nearly doomed them.

The Ducks, the NHL’s most penalized team, set up Colorado with three consecutive power plays in a 4 1/2 -minute span of the third. The last one, an interference call on Niedermayer, was converted by Milan Hejduk of the Avalanche to forge a 3-3 tie.

“You never want to take those three penalties like we did when you have a one-goal lead,” Niedermayer said. “That’s unacceptable, no matter what calls you think they are.”

The Ducks are also shelling out $13 million for Niedermayer and Pronger to lead, and they went about doing that.

Niedermayer found an opening in the Avalanche zone to receive a pass from Samuel Pahlsson, and the captain banked in a wrist shot off the left post past Colorado goalie Jose Theodore.

After a double-minor high-sticking penalty on Hejduk, Pronger scored from the point for his 10th goal. Niedermayer got his second assist for his third three-point game this season.

“Who scored the last two goals?” Carlyle said. “They took that responsibility on themselves. And they were the difference.” Carlyle met with several of the team’s core players, including Niedermayer, Pronger and Selanne, on Saturday and indicated that he wanted them to take on more of a leadership role down the stretch.

“I think we thought that ourselves before the meeting,” Niedermayer said. “You realize when you’ve been around and you’re in a leadership role as a player with a letter on your shirt that you’re looked at in times like this to be the guy or the guys that people look to.”

*

Colorado’s Karlis Skrastins was scratched because of a knee injury, ending his NHL-record consecutive game streak for a defenseman at 495.

TONIGHT

at San Jose, 7, Versus

Site -- HP Pavilion.

Radio -- 830.

Records -- Ducks 36-17-10, Sharks 38-23-1.

Record vs. Sharks -- 3-2-0.

Update -- Veteran Craig Rivet, acquired from Montreal in a trade Sunday, should make his debut for San Jose.

eric.stephens@latimes.com