Ducks Get Buried in Meadowlands

EAST RUTHERFORD, N.J. — This was the night the Mighty Ducks had feared all along, deep in their well-traveled souls and from the bottom of their purple-covered hearts.

This was the night they shot at the Mighty Ducks . . . and the Mighty Ducks failed to shoot back.

The shots came between the first and second periods Wednesday night at Meadowlands Arena, as part of the on-ice entertainment--or, what passes for entertainment on a midweek October evening in New Jersey.

It involved the New Jersey Devils’ red-headed mascot, a toy rifle, a hunting dog and a P.A. announcement: “It’s the first Duck-hunting exhibition of the season!” (Nudge, nudge.) Soon, Devil Person was cracking off pretend shotgun blasts into the rafters, bringing down stuffed Mickey and Minnie Mouse dolls that his faithful companion faithfully retrieved.

This was followed by three humans dressed in Duck jerseys and huge duck heads, trudging across the ice like targets in a shooting gallery. Devil Person aimed again and brought each of them down, one by one, to the piped-in sound of “Ding! Ding! Ding!”

Ducks president Tony Tavares, watching from the press box, laughed along with the shtick before quickly noting that those three Duck jerseys cost money--$125-per-jersey kind of money.

“That’s nothing but a cash register ringing,” Tavares quipped to the writers seated below.

Well, it certainly wasn’t the shot clock.

The numbers on the Ducks’ side of the board seemed to change by the hour.

Five shots on goal in the first period.

Five shots on goal in the second period.

Ten minutes without a shot to start the game.

Eight minutes without a shot to start the third period.

The Ducks also managed one shot in the first nine minutes of the second period. Total it up and the Ducks spent 27 minutes--almost half the game--without putting more than a single shot on goal.

The Ducks lost, 4-0, but you could have guessed that.

The shutout was the first in franchise history.

The 17 shots tied a franchise low, first established last week in a 1-1 tie against Boston.

All of this came within 24 hours of the franchise’s first road victory, a 4-2 triumph over the Rangers at Madison Square Garden.

So, yes, it has been a trip of landmark proportions.

Having delayed the inevitable in rather startling fashion--fly 3,000 miles, hop off the plane, mug the Rangers in New York--the Ducks finally looked the part Wednesday: a tired, emotionally drained expansion team looking not so much for an opening in the Devils’ defense as a place to curl up and catch some Zs.

“Obviously, we didn’t have much energy tonight,” Coach Ron Wilson said. “Flying coast-to-coast and then playing back-to-back games, it’s not a fair schedule. Why did we have to play tonight? What’s going on here tomorrow? Nothing. Why not play this game on Thursday night instead?”

Wilson, of course, ought to know better. One does not question the ways of the NHL, mysterious and zany as they often are. One merely shakes one’s head, packs one’s bags, tries to remember what city one is in on this night and skates to exhaustion, or the final horn, whichever comes first.

“There was wasn’t much flow to the game, and we made it an uglier game because we didn’t have our legs,” Wilson said. “We’ve got to get 25, 30 shots on goal to have a chance to win, but we just didn’t have the energy to get the job done.”

It became the game within the game: Guess which minute the Ducks manage their first shot of the period. Terry Yake, the hat-trick hero of Tuesday night, had one shot in the first period, no shots in the second and two for the entire game. Hat tricks are harder to come by when you only shoot twice.

After two periods, 40 minutes of ice time, the Ducks had 10 shots on goal--and a defenseman, Sean Hill, had nearly a third of them. Stu Grimson took as many shots--one--as left wing Joe Sacco and center Anatoli Semenov, both members of the Ducks’ first line.

This is not the recommended method for winning on the road in the NHL.

“We seemed to be in the penalty box the whole game,” said left wing Troy Loney, a good point. The Devils had nine power plays to the Ducks’ four--they scored on two of them--while assorted Ducks burned a total of 20 minutes in the penalty box.

“That’s why it was difficult to get into the flow,” Yake said. “Nothing much is happening, but you’re trying to get a fluke shot to go your way, you have an opportunity to turn it up a notch--and then there’s a penalty. One way or another, that breaks up the flow. It seemed like we spent all the time killing penalties.”

Then again, maybe it was the Meadowlands. A month ago, the Rams played here and fared not one iota better. The Giants and the Devils play different sports, but they play them the same way--defense first, grind the opposition to dust, bore them into submission if need be.

The Devils are also undefeated, 6-0 now, with Florida coming in next. It can make for a good living, playing host to these expansion teams.

The Ducks, meanwhile, were headed to Montreal for a couple of days off and a place to rest their heads. “The road can really wear on you,” center Tim Sweeney had to admit. “There are days when you simply need to rest.”

Sweeney managed a tired smile.

“The trick is figuring out which days those are.”

Preferably, they are the ones without hockey scheduled for the evening.