Anaheim must rejuvenate

Ducks haven't threatened Brodeur, Devils in series

? Two games into a fast-slipping-away Stanley Cup finals for the Anaheim Mighty Ducks, no finalist since 1945 has done so little in so much time.

No wins. No goals. No momentum. No semblance of an offense. No reason to think the New Jersey Devils, two wins away from their third Stanley Cup in nine seasons, are about to let them back into a series in which they have yet to threaten to score a goal, much less win a game.

The dawdling Ducks weren’t just beaten in nearly identical 3-0 games in which they managed just 16 shots in each, they barely were competitive.

Martin Brodeur, the first goalie to start the finals with two shutouts since Toronto’s Frank McCool against Detroit in 1945, has been Martin McCool, turning aside everything he’s seen with a confident calmness that must be unnerving to the Ducks.

Certainly, a 2-0 lead isn’t a guarantee the Devils will hoist yet another Stanley Cup in a few days; the Devils, after all, led Ottawa 3-1 in the Eastern Conference finals not even two weeks ago and wound up having to score late in Game 7 to advance.

As they prepared to play Game 3 today at the Pond, where they are 6-1 in the postseason, the Ducks must be mighty concerned they’ve conceded too big of an edge and too much momentum to the Devils.

“We don’t have emotion when we play, that’s what’s been lacking so far,” goaltender Jean-Sebastien Giguere said Friday. “I don’t know what it is. Maybe we think we don’t deserve to win. … But I’ll be disappointed if everybody doesn’t show up with a lot of emotion.”

There was no passion lacking in Giguere. When a reporter suggested to Paul Kariya the Ducks might be a fluke team that doesn’t belong in the finals — Carolina from a year ago was cited as an example — Giguere immediately stepped in and answered.

Devils goaltender martin brodeur makes a save during the first period against the Mighty Ducks. New Jersey beat Anaheim Thursday in East Rutherford, N.J.

“We’re not a fluke … no way are we a fluke. We beat Detroit, Dallas, Minnesota, we deserve to be here,” he said. “They (the Devils) aren’t a better team than we are. We are able to beat them, but everybody has to come and play their game.”

So far, whatever it is the Ducks are doing isn’t working. They’re not getting bodies to the net to create traffic, as the Devils did on their first two goals in Game 2 Thursday. They’re not making Brodeur work hard for his saves. They’re not getting the puck out of their zone with any speed or consistency. They’re not clearing out the net in front of Giguere, who was near perfect in the first three rounds but has been far from perfect in the finals.

So far, the only sign of on-ice emotion or intensity was Giguere smashing his stick after being beaten Thursday on former teammate Jeff Friesen’s third goal in two games.

No doubt the Ducks will be a more desperate team in Game 3, especially in front of their own fans. But will that be enough? Only two years ago, the Devils let a Stanley Cup slip away when they couldn’t close out the Avalanche with a 3-2 series lead, so they know the dangers of letting a team back into a series.

“We don’t want to give them any momentum, any kind of confidence,” Brodeur said.