Ducks Dunk Flyers in Final Seconds

ANAHEIM, CA: February 7, 2002 — The Anaheim Mighty Ducks had not won a game they trailed after two periods. The Philadelphia Flyers had not lost a game in which they scored more than three goals. Both streaks ended on Wednesday night, as Paul Kariya punctuated his 500th NHL game with his seventh career three-goal game and Oleg Tverdovsky scored with 12.6 seconds left to give the Ducks a 5-4 victory over the Eastern Conference leaders. "It was a great win for our team," Kariya said. "It's good to keep the momentum going. To come back from two goals down and win against a team like that has got to be good for our confidence." Anaheim won its sixth straight while the Flyers' winless streak against Anaheim extended to five games 0-3-2.

Philadelphia is 1-3-4 in its last eight meetings with the Ducks.

"It's embarrassing – unacceptable. It shouldn't have happened," Flyers leading scorer Jeremy Roenick said during a profanity-laced tirade. "It was a joke."

It was the 50th career multi-goal game and second hat trick this season for Kariya, whose 570 career points are the most by any NHL player 27 years old or younger.

"I've been around too long. I'm getting old," joked Kariya, whose final goal came on a power play when he got a cross-ice pass from Mike Leclerc's and zipped it past Brian Boucher's glove for his 22nd of the season.

For the game-winner, Patric Kjellberg shrugged off a check by Philadelphia captain Keith Primeau in the right corner and fed the puck to Tverdovsky. He beat a screened Boucher to the glove side with a slap shot from the point. v "There were two guys in front of me. I saw him shoot, but I never saw the puck," said Boucher, who surrendered five goals for the second time in five starts. "With a 4-2 lead, you should win the game. But you have to give them credit. They played hard, and they played ever harder when they were down by two."

The Ducks, 1-19-1 when trailing after two periods, also got a goal from German Titov and three assists from rookie Andy McDonald, tying the club rookie record.

Marty Murray had a goal and an assist and Kim Johnsson scored on a power play for the Flyers, who are 18-1-0 this season when they score more than three goals. Roenick and Mark Recchi each had two assists and Ruslan Fedotenko scored his 14th goal.

"This is a game that slipped away from us," John LeClair said. "We had some power-play opportunities in the second period that we should have scored on and put the game away with. We should have played smarter and tightened up a little bit."

Philadelphia, whose league-leading 18 road victories match last season's total, took an early 2-0 edge on goals by Murray and Johnsson but Kariya got the Ducks back in the game with a one-timer from 20 feet with 47 seconds left in the period.

Fedotenko restored Philadelphia's two-goal margin at 1:43 of the second with a short backhander. Anaheim closed to 3-2 at 12:05 of the second when Kariya converted a rebound.

"When you're up two goals on the road, you win by two," Flyers coach Bill Barber said. "We were too casual with our game tonight."

Gagne gave Philadelphia a 4-2 lead at 5:09 of the third period, but Titov brought Anaheim within 4-3 less than 1½ minutes later.

Notes: Flyers TV analyst Gary Dornhoefer, who helped Philadelphia win back-to-back Stanley Cups in the mid-70s, returned to the microphone following Monday's funeral for his daughter Stephanie, 35. Dornhoefer missed eight games during the final stages of her battle with breast cancer. An education fund has been established for his 4-year-old granddaughter, Sydney. ... Philadelphia's 13 shots in the second period ended a streak of 11 consecutive periods in which Anaheim held its opponents to fewer than 10 shots on net. ... Johnsson leads Philadelphia's defensemen with 37 points. ... Murray, who signed with the Flyers as free agent in July, played parts of four seasons with Calgary before 2001-02 but never appeared in more than 15 games.

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Author: 6-ABC-AP