ANAHEIM — The fledgling Ducks soared above perhaps the most established core in the NHL, Sidney Crosby and the Pittsburgh Penguins, for a 5-1 victory on Thursday night at Honda Center.
The Ducks had lost four straight games and seven of eight entering the matchup, while the Penguins were coming off a 5-1 manhandling of the Kings on Monday night at Crypto.com Arena.
Mason McTavish and Alex Killorn each burst out of their respective scoring funks with two-goal efforts, and Frank Vatrano also scored. Troy Terry contributed two assists to extend his team lead in scoring, matching the output of Jacob Trouba. Pittsburgh native John Gibson turned in an inspired performance, making 31 saves.
Michael Bunting deposited a power-play goal for Pittsburgh. Alex Nedeljkovic stopped 29 of the 33 shots he faced.
After shaking off a sluggish start, the Ducks struck twice in the first period, turned in a sound second despite surrendering a power-play goal and then pulled away with another pair of even-strength goals and an empty-netter to cement the victory.
Early in the third period, a wild sequence saw the two sides trade sterling chances before the Ducks cushioned their lead off McTavish’s second goal of the night.
First, Cody Glass tested Gibson’s glove with a shot from the slot, before the Ducks went the other way and nearly created a backdoor tap-in for Vatrano, who couldn’t steer the puck on net, instead sending it to the top of the cage.
But after Brian Dumoulin’s dump-in took a fortuitous hop off the end boards and into the slot, McTavish glided into the puck and dazzled with his dangles, working a frazzled Nedeljkovic out of position to sweep in his ninth goal of 2024-25.The Ducks led 3-1, just 2:06 into the final frame.
With 13:08 to play, Vatrano put the game in the refrigerator. A gassed Evgeni Malkin couldn’t catch up to a two-on-one rush on which Erik Karlsson couldn’t impede Terry’s cross-ice pass for Vatrano, setting up a forehand-to-backhand-to-forehand move that allowed him to tuck a shot inside the far post for his 13th goal of the campaign. Vatrano has as many goals against Pittsburgh and Tampa Bay.
McTavish nearly completed his hat trick into the empty net, but a last ditch effort by former Duck Rickard Rakell forced his one-handed shot attempt into the post. Instead it was Killorn scoring his second goal of the game and 10th of the season into the vacated cage with two minutes on the clock.
Continuing one of their spurts this season during the second period, the Ducks seemed poised to put the Penguins in a three-goal hole, until Jackson LaCombe’s interference penalty gave Pittsburgh a power play.
The Ducks skirted disaster when Bryan Rust pushed a rebound wide of an open net. But after the Penguins regrouped, Rust would earn the primary assist with a cross-crease pass to Bunting, with the duo having isolated and outnumbered Dumoulin. At the 5:32 mark of the second period, the Ducks had their lead sliced in half.
Vatrano nearly got that goal back with 11:31 remaining in the second period, but Nedeljkovic got a small piece of the puck. As the two-minute mark loomed, Radko Gudas’ broken stick created an odd-man rush for Pittsburgh. Crosby feathered a pass for Karlsson, but Gibson’s acrobatic left-pad save preserved the Ducks’ edge at the second intermission.
Though the Penguins controlled possession early by bottling the Ducks up with their forecheck, the Ducks responded with a flurry of their own and the game’s first goal, 9:28 into the match.
It was a grinding effort as Trouba’s point shot created a rebound that McTavish pushed to Robby Fabbri, whose diving followup generated yet another rebound while drawing Nedeljkovic out of position, enabling McTavish to poke his first goal in seven games into an open net.
The Ducks doubled their advantage with 59 seconds left in the first period. Killorn battled through two Penguins to track down Drew Helleson’s pass, fending off P.O. Joseph and former Duck Marcus Pettersson to send a laser past Nedeljkovic. It was Killorn’s first goal in eight games and his second in 17. The secondary assist for Trevor Zegras, who missed more than six weeks with a knee injury, was his first point since Nov. 27.
More to come on this story.
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