Sykora cues Ducks’ 5-4 defeat

PITTSBURGH -- No other group of players could be more relieved to head home than the Ducks.

The airplane ride back to Southern California won’t be all that joyous, thanks to the Pittsburgh Penguins dealing a 5-4 setback Saturday night that left the Ducks with just one win on their five-game trip to open the season. But the Ducks could at least take solace in finally waving goodbye to a 13-day, 10,000-mile-plus odyssey that began in London. Captain Chris Pronger said all he planned to do on the way home was sleep.

“I think we’re too tired to be angry,” Pronger said. “It’ll just be nice to get back home.”

Petr Sykora haunted his former team with two goals and an assist, including a third-period score with 6:28 remaining to break a 3-3 tie before a Mellon Arena crowd of 17,132 in the Penguins’ home opener.

Ryan Malone tallied 19 seconds later for a two-goal lead, an advantage they would need as Corey Perry scored with 21.4 seconds left. The Ducks called time out and pulled goalie Jonas Hiller for the extra attacker but could not manage a decent opportunity against Pittsburgh’s Marc-Andre Fleury.

Hiller made 24 saves in his first start since winning his NHL debut against the Kings. Fleury stopped 19 shots.

It wasn’t the way the Ducks (1-3-1) would envision starting their defense of the Stanley Cup, but they also didn’t anticipate being without several key performers, notably Jean-Sebastien Giguere, Samuel Pahlsson and Mathieu Schneider, who are all injured.

Giguere and Pahlsson are recovering slowly from sports hernia surgery late in the off-season, and Schneider continued to be sidelined with a broken left ankle suffered during the preseason.

“We feel we’ll get better when we get our group together,” Ducks Coach Randy Carlyle said.

Early on in his tenure, Ducks General Manager Brian Burke shook up a struggling team by trading Sykora and Sergei Fedorov, two proven, but underperforming veterans, in separate moves that triggered a different mind-set throughout the franchise.

Carlyle, in his first season, preferred grinding players that brought a high level of energy every night, and Fedorov and Sykora didn’t fit the tough, take-no-prisoner style he wanted. Burke happily agreed with that. While neither will second-guess those moves that shattered the Ducks’ image of being soft, they came back to bite Anaheim again.

A night after Fedorov had a goal and an assist for Columbus in its 4-0 victory Friday, Sykora busted loose in his second game with the Penguins after a half-season with the New York Rangers and one full season in Edmonton with the Oilers.

Sykora tied the score at 1-1 in the first period with a power-play goal and set up Evgeni Malkin with a bang-bang, cross-ice feed on which Hiller had no chance. In the decisive third, the Czech winger jammed in a rebound after Chris Kunitz’s second goal tied the score.

“When you see those guys out there and you know you’ve been with them for a few years, you always get a little more excited” to play, Sykora said. “Last year, I had a full four games against the Ducks and I had nothing. It’s nice to finally get a goal against them.”

The Ducks made some roster moves to create a different look. Rookie Bobby Ryan was sent down to minor league Portland, Maine, and wingers Drew Miller and Jason King were recalled and immediately inserted into the lineup.

Maxim Kondratiev, whom they acquired for Sykora on Jan. 8, 2006, also played his first game on defense as Joe DiPenta was scratched. None of the additions proved significant.

But the Ducks were at least satisfied with their effort after their listless loss to the Blue Jackets. Kunitz had three points, Ryan Getzlaf had a goal and an assist, and Francois Beauchemin set up three goals.

“We did a lot of the good things that we are going to have to continue to get better at,” Carlyle said.

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eric.stephens@latimes.com