Ducks lose to the Blue Jackets, 4-3

The Kings and Ducks were a combined 15-1-1 at home at the beginning of this week.

Then the Columbus Blue Jackets came to town.

They halted the Kings’ unbeaten start at Staples Center on Wednesday, and completed the Southern California sweep with a 4-3 win over the Ducks at the Honda Center on Friday.

The Ducks had been 7-1-1 at home, but they gave up three consecutive goals in the second period and couldn’t get more than one goal in the third against Columbus goaltender Steve Mason, who faced 50 shots, a season high by the Ducks.

The Ducks were without a key component down the stretch after Teemu Selanne went into the dressing room with what Coach Randy Carlyle later said was a sore groin.

Selanne was listed as questionable to return but did not.

“Teemu Selanne is something this team needs,” winger Bobby Ryan said. “He’s so good with that one-timer. Maybe it’s a different game out there. He’s a catalyst for us.”

It was another tight game for the Ducks.

Nine of their last 10 have been one-goal margins, and the other was a two-goal win with an empty-netter at the end.

The game wasn’t without its highlights for the Ducks.

They gained a two-man advantage at the end of the first period after Jan Hejda and Marc Methot were called for hooking 11 seconds apart, and converted 17 seconds into the second when Saku Koivu scored off a perfect give-and-go play with Selanne.

Ryan Getzlaf nearly scored shortly after, but his sharply angled shot from the right side went through Mason’s legs and rang off the left goalpost.

And Ryan scored his eighth goal of the season — and the first short-handed goal of his career — on a breakaway after Todd Marchant knocked down a pass with his skate on the Blue Jackets’ power play and backhanded it down the ice. Ryan won the race to the puck and flicked it in for a 2-1 lead at 5:01 of the second.

That lead lasted all of 25 seconds.

Columbus, which took an early 1-0 lead on Rick Nash’s first-period goal, tied the score, 2-2, when Chris Clark stood in front of the net and redirected a point shot by Mike Commodore that went in between the pads of goaltender Jonas Hiller.

“It’s a little deflating,” Ryan said. “When you do score short-handed, it doesn’t happen very much. You’ve got to take the momentum.”

The Blue Jackets added a goal by Jakub Voracek at 13:48 after a Ducks’ turnover when Kyle Palmieri stepped on the puck and fell.

The third, the first of the season for Commodore, came at the 16:56 mark.

Corey Perry scored his team-leading 10th from Getzlaf at 7:22 of the third, but the Ducks couldn’t get another past Mason, despite 25 third-period shots.

But the ultimate problem was the three consecutive goals they allowed against a Blue Jackets team that has developed a formula that has them 6-1 on the road.

“If you look at it, the goals that were scored on a deflection or a rebound — they weren’t necessarily individuals or end-to-end rushes,” Carlyle said.

“They just play a grinding road game.”

sports@latimes.com