Olympic Hangover
by Karen Francis
Hockeytalk.biz

MARCH 5, 2010 -- ANAHEIM -- Everyone talks about a Stanley Cup hangover, but it was clear that there was an Olympic hangover for the Ducks in their 4-3 loss to Colorado on Wednesday evening at Honda Center.

The Ducks had a 2-0 lead on goals from Jason Blake and Teemu Selanne, who is now just two goals away from 600. It went downhill from there and Colorado scored four straight goals to win 4-3.

“We played one period of hockey,” said coach Randy Carlyle after the game. “We didn’t play very well after the first period. They turned it up. We stopped doing what we needed to do and we started getting cute. We played too soft around the puck. We didn’t get into the dirty areas. And some individuals had bad nights.”

While not naming names, some of those players appeared to be those who returned from the Olympic break with medals around their necks.

“Hopefully we can carryover the energy and excitement and intensity right into this playoff run that we have now and use it to our advantage,” Niedermayer had commented the day before the game to a throng of media interested in the Olympic experience.

The energy, excitement and intensity just were not there after the first period.

Neither was a full complement of defensemen. After a busy trade deadline day, the Ducks were down to five defensemen, having sent Ryan Whitney to Edmonton in exchange for veteran Lubomir Visnovsky. The Ducks also acquired another veteran in Aaron Ward from the Carolina Hurricanes in return for goaltending prospect, Justin Pogge.

While the Ducks were playing Colorado, both Visnovsky and Ward were on an airplane headed to California.

“It’s always a strain, but that is the hand we were dealt,” said Carlyle matter-of-factly. “Sometimes those things happen. We only had five d-men available to us because we couldn’t get anybody here by the time everything was settled. The NHL won’t allow you to bring people in until the trade call is complete. You can’t make reservations, you can’t do anything.”

Visnovsky and Ward are finally here, however, and the Ducks need them.

Visnovsky, a former King, is familiar with the Ducks, having played against them for seven seasons. He is expected to help out on the power play and provide some offense. While not the biggest guy out there, he is still competitive and Carlyle described him as “very effective moving around the ice.”

Visnovsky has not seen any playoff action since 2002, something he would like to change this year.

“I’m very excited to come here and play in California again,” said Visnovsky after his first practice with his new teammates. “For me, it is very important to play in the playoffs. I’d like to do as best as I can to try to help this team.”

Ward, on the other hand, has seen plenty of playoff action and has won the Stanley Cup twice. He is a big, stay-at-home defenseman, and he takes pride in his shot blocking skills.

“I think there’s an art to doing it - timing, not deflecting it,” said Ward. “That’s the best thing I can do. A lot of shot blocking comes down to willingness. I’m not pretty, but I strive to get the job done. Sometimes with a defenseman, maybe the least noticed you are, that’s the best game you played.”

Both players still need to make adjustments and learn a new system, something that Ward acknowledged made him feel like a “rookie.” However, their addition now gives the Ducks a few more options on the blue line.

“We’re going to try to fit some people together that are going to give us the best chance,” Carlyle commented. “We think we’ve played Niedermayer and Wisniewski too much in the past little while. Hopefully some of these new guys and the guys we have here will come in and take some of those minutes away.”

Theoretically, the Olympic distraction will now be over. The seven remaining Olympic players had their final media event on Thursday afternoon, a relief to Carlyle.

“We had a skeleton crew because we designated this day for our Olympians to put finality to their requirements and requests from media,” said Carlyle. “From this day forward, that’s something in the past. We’ve got to focus on our task at hand. Get everything put by the wayside today and come to work tomorrow. That will be the end of it. That’s the last we’re going to talk about it.”

The Ducks also need to put away the game against Colorado and move forward. Especially if they want to make it into the playoffs.

“Right now every game is important,” said goaltender Jonas Hiller. “It’s tough. We were close. We had a 2-0 lead and gave the game away. We have 19 games left and we still have a lot of chances.”

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