ANAHEIM -- This time it wasn't just lucky. It was just Ducky. And, in the end, a little Daffy, too.
The Anaheim Ducks, may have been fortunate to be leading the Western
Conference final three games to two going
into Game 6 but luck had nothing to do with putting the Detroit Red Wings
away here last night.
The way Ducks dispatched Detroit, nobody is going to devalue Anaheim making
it a to the Stanley Cup final for the
second time in their history and the second time in the last four seasons
even if they damn near blew a 4-1 lead
late.
"The third period wasn't pretty but who cares right now?" said Teemu
Selanne, the former Winnipeg Jet who will be
going to the Stanley Cup final for the first time in his career.
In the end, after turning a mop-up job into a fright night, it was a 4-3
win by the Ducks to make the match with the
Ottawa Senators for the first Stanley Cup final featuring two teams which
have never won the trophy before since
Dallas-Buffalo in 1999.
"We let Game 4 and Game 5 get away and they got a lot of pressure on us
really and we didn't help ourselves with
our lack of poise," said Wings coach Mike Babcock.
The Red Wings now haven't won an elimination game in the playoffs since
2002.
The Ducks, as was the case in closing out the Vancouver Canucks, came out
determined to win the majority of little
battles and races to the puck and took a quick 7-1 lead in shots on goal
which ended up at 14-7 at the end of the
first period.
Chris Pronger's shot from the point off Rob Neidermayer's skate at the top
of the crease, gave the Ducks a 1-0 lead
3:51 into the game. It was on a delayed penalty at the midway mark of the
sandwich session when Corey Perry
slapped a rebound home to make it 2-0. Ryan Getzlaf backhanded a puck Todd
Marchant had dug out of a scramble
in front of the net to provide a three-goal margin.
After Henrik Zetterberg scored for the Wings early in the third Samuel
Pahlsson replied for the Ducks 5-on-5 the
Ducks had goals shorthanded, on a delayed penalty, on the power play and
even strength. Sort of a twisted hockey
version of hitting for the cycle.
"At that point, they had nothing to lose so they were going to come at us
with everything they had," said captain
Scott Neidermayer.
Pavel Datsyuk scored midway in the period and again on a power play with
just over three minutes to go. Then
Travis Moen made it really interesting by taking a penalty to provide the
Wings with a power play and an extra man
advantage with Dominik Hasek out of the net to provide a frantic finish.
"They took the attitude of being desperate and we didn't skate and a kind
of paralysis took over the team," said
coach Randy Carlyle.
"It sure made things exciting in the end."
