ANAHEIM -- The most atypical thing about the start to the Ducks' season is that the home-ice advantage hasn't been one.
"This has been our happy place the last three or four years," noted forward Teemu Selanne. "Our home record this year has been really different."
Even with Monday's 4-1 win over Colorado, the Ducks are just 6-6-2 at the Honda Center, where they've been 80-25-18 (a .724 percentage) over the last three seasons.
If they were similarly mediocre on the road, this might not be that noteworthy. But away from home, they're 6-2-1, and have an active streak of seven straight road games in which they've earned points (6-0-1).
And so, entering Monday's game, there was a growing sense of urgency for the Ducks to correct their home-ice deficiency.
"Time for us to step up and make an impression in our home building," said Ducks coach Randy Carlyle. "We haven't started that well, and you can't have a successful record if you don't start well at home."
The Ducks haven't started well whether you're looking at the overall schedule, or individual games. Before Monday, they'd been outscored 14-13 in the first period at home, and had given up the first goal in six of the 13 games, going 1-5 on those games. (On the road, they've allowed the first goal just twice.)
"At home, a few games we're getting behind the eight ball early and on our heels quick," said forward Corey Perry, "and we're trying to play catch-up the rest of the night.
"Maybe we're just playing our style of game on the road, and when we come home, we have to bring that back and play our grinding style of game."
Agrees Selanne, "I think this year, on the road, we have been more focused on urgency and good starts. At home, we have been a little too loose."
Selanne also offers the theory that the Ducks may have been hurt by, oddly enough, having too many home games, or at least too many at one time.
"I personally believe that if you play more than four games in a row at home, then it's going to be tough," he says. "Because home games, you should get so excited. And you get so many in a row, you get a little flat."
should be you get so excited, and you get so many in a row, you get a little flat."
Anaheim recently concluded a six-game homestand, part of a stretch in which nine of 10 games were at home -- and the other one was in Los Angeles. The Ducks began those nine home games by going 3-0-1, then were 1-3-1.
You'll often hear players say it's easier to concentrate on the task at hand on the road, but Selanne doesn't really think that explains the disparity.
"Yeah, there's no distractions," he said. "But same hand" -- that's not a typo, but a classic Selanne-ism -- "if you look at the record last year, we are .750 at home and .500 on the road. It doesn't sound like there's distractions here."
Beyond that, the Ducks are aware of the issue, but have a hard time saying why it has developed.
"I don't know," said Carlyle. "Obviously, it's our job as coaches to take some responsibility for that. As simple as that. Whatever we choose to do to motivate our players has not been something that has been working on our behalf. We'll have to change it."
The focus entering Monday's game was to change the result by changing the start, and to change that start by building on a series of small goal.
"That's something we were focusing on going in," said Chris Kunitz, "starting with everything first (that is) good -- first hit, first shot, first save, draw the first penalty and all that kind of stuff. That's one of the reasons we kept going the whole game."
The Ducks may not have exactly followed that plan. With Nathan McIver and Colorado's Cody McLeod earning fighting majors just seven seconds into the game, it's hard to say who had the first hit, and while the Ducks had the first power play, it was hard to say they "drew" it, since Colorado was called for too many men on the ice.
But in general, they were the better team from the start, and they certainly were in the way that mattered most, taking a 2-0 lead in the first period on goals by Selanne and Kunitz just 3:20 apart.
Since Colorado had scored just 17 goals in its previous 11 games, that figured to be enough. And it was, particularly since the Ducks sustained the effort, and even improved on it in a second period that saw the control the play and outshoot the Avs 8-4.
"We know the potential we have in this dressing room," said goaltender Jean-Sebastien Giguere, "but I don't think we've reached our potential since the beginning of the year. I don't think there's one game where we can say we played a full 60 minutes that was flawless.
"There's no games that are flawless, but tonight was as close as we could be. The second period, I thought, was our best all year. We controlled the play, spent most of the period in their zone, and when you do that, things are going to go your way."

It is, of course, too early to say the Ducks have solved their home-ice problems. That would take sustained success, which has been elusive so far; the team has won consecutive home games just once.
But if nothing else, Monday's game reinforced their knowledge of the formula for success.
"That's the attitude we have to get to," said Selanne, "to get a good first period. Tied or better after the first, you have a good chance."
Said Carlyle, "It's more of that type of intensity, more of that type of overall play that we're looking for, especially in our building, because we've been able to do that historically here with this group."

It takes a rather specific mix of patience and preparedness to be a backup goaltender.
Jonas Hiller certainly seems to have the right elements.
The 26-year-old from Switzerland earned his first NHL shutout Sunday evening, making 29 saves as the Ducks beat the Kings 2-0 and adding to his credentials as a dependable substitute for Jean-Sebastien Giguere.
"At the end, it counts that the team wins," Hiller said. "But for sure, it's a great feeling for a goalie."
Coach Randy Carlyle didn't go overboard in his praise for Hiller's work -- that's not exactly his M.O. -- but said, "He made some stops that prove again that he's an NHL quality goaltender."
Captain Scott Niedermayer was willing to go a bit farther.
"He's a great goalie," said defenseman Scott Niedermayer. "Probably a lot of us didn't really realize it when he first got here, but he plays great. He works hard in practice, makes it tough for us there, and plays well when he's in the net, for sure."
Hiller, who became Anaheim's No. 2 netminder last season when Ilya Bryzgalov was released, was 10-7-1 with a 2.06 goals-against in 2007-08. With Sunday's win, he's 3-1-1 with a 2.18 goals-against and .926 saves percentage in what has been very close to an every-fourth-game rotation as a starter, having started the Ducks fourth, eighth, 12th, 15th and 19th games.
"It's just kind of the way it's worked out," said Carlyle. "We've stated it before when I've said 1A and 1B" -- two goalies sharing the position rather than a No. 1 and a backup -- "but that's where we want to get to. We think there's potential for that to happen here, and that's a great position to be in, as far as a coach."
Hiller, naturally, would welcome more starting opportunities.
"For sure I was looking to get more games than last year, more starts," said Hiller. "You can't always say, 'Yeah, you're playing that game.' It depends on how the team's playing, how the schedule is. But I'm happy to play that many games, and just (want to) keep going and play good so I can hopefully get some more."
Not surprisingly, he says waiting for starts is the toughest part of the backup role.
"You have to stay sharp and prepare for those few starts," he said. "Francoise Allaire (the Ducks' goaltending coach) helps me there a lot, doing drills, game-like drills."
The Ducks were probably all too helpful in getting Hiller warmed up on Sunday. He made 14 of his saves in the first period, thanks to three Los Angeles power plays.
"It's easier to get some shots at the beginning, move around and get the confidence, especially if you stop them," he said. "It gives you much confidence. Especially if you don't play that much, it's easier to get in the game."
Hiller's path to the NHL was an indirect one. While he dreamed of playing in the league, it took a while for him to get noticed in Switzerland. He was never selected for the junior national team, and went undrafted.
"It was also my good luck that I was never the big talent," he said, "so I knew I always had to keep working, and I did. And I moved up in the Swiss League first, got some starts on the national team that gave me a lot of confidence and experience, and took it step by step."
He played four years in the Swiss League and was named the league's best goalie in 2006-07, going 28-16-0 with a 2.60 goals-against in the regular season and 12-7 with a 2.05 GAA in the playoffs, leading Davos to the Swiss Championship. That led to a two-year contract with the Ducks; he spent six games with the team's Portland, Me., affiliate before coming to Anaheim.
"I look forward to the next seasons," he said, "and hopefully things will go the way I want."
Nice place to be: Forward Bobby Ryan might easily have started the season with the Ducks, based on his preseason performance. But as a victim of the salary-cap numbers game, he began the season with the Ducks' new minor-league affiliate in Iowa.
That changed Sunday, when he rejoined the team -- and found himself on the Ducks' top line with Ryan Getzlaf and Corey Perry, something he learned "only about three or four minutes before the game, before warm-ups," Ryan said afterward.
"It's not like it's weight off your shoulders; I think the pressure's still there," said the 21-year-old, the No. 2 pick overall in the 2005 draft. "But it's like, 'OK, I know if I'm in trouble, these guys could bail me out, if it comes to that.'
"I'm certainly going to be getting some chances to put the puck in the net in the near future, if that sticks. So I was extremely excited."
Ryan had five goals and five assists in a 23-game stint with the Ducks last season. In Sunday's season debut, he had no points, two shots, two hits, a giveaway and a takeaway in just under 17 minutes.
"I thought he fit in and did a lot of things we're asking him to do in that situation with Getzlaf and Perry," said Carlyle. "I think that's important that he understands that. I think there's some turnovers that he can improve on, but it's his first game and I'm not going to be critical of the individual, because he gave us what we needed in that situation.
"I know he can score. We'd just like him to play that grinding game, that cycle game, and when he gets his opportunity, put the puck in the net."
So is Ryan going to be a fixture on the top line, particularly since it allows Teemu Selanne and Chris Kunitz to play together?
"It's only one game," said Carlyle. "So I don't read anything into it. That's what we tried tonight."
Fire relief: Sunday's game was the first of a joint effort by the Kings and Ducks to raise money for victims of this week's fires. Both teams will accept donations at their next home game -- Wednesday against Washington for the Ducks and Thursday against the Capitals for the Kings. In addition, each organization is making a $25,000 donation to fire victims.
For the Ducks, the fire losses hit home. The Yorba Linda house of team doctor Craig Milhouse was destroyed in the fire that swept through that community.

The Ducks have been pretty busy since the start of the National Hockey League season. So they welcome a few days when they aren't.
Sunday's 3-1 loss to Florida was the team's 17th game -- tied with the New York Rangers for the most in the league, four more than seven other Western Conference teams and five more than the league's least active team, the Montreal Canadiens. They'll now get their first prolonged break since the season began Oct. 9; they don't play again until Friday, when they host Nashville.
And so, even in the wake of back-to-back losses -- the Ducks were beaten 5-2 by Dallas on Friday -- coach Randy Carlyle didn't hesitate to give his players two full days off.
"It's the first chance we've had in a long time to have a two-day break," said Carlyle, "So as tough as it is to give, I think that it's really just giving an extra day, because normally we would have a day off.
"We feel at this time it's important for them to get their rest, get their heads free of hockey for 48 hours, clean the garage and kiss their wife."
The players happily accepted that opportunity.
"It's huge," said forward Ryan Getzlaf, who enters the respite in a third-place tie in the league scoring race with 19 points. "We've got to use these four days properly. We're getting an opportunity where we can get a little rest and then get going again. ... The amount of games we've played the last little while, we've done a pretty good job thus far of taking our schedule and working with it."
Now, says goalie Jean-Sebastien Giguere, the team needs to take advantage of the breather.
"We have to look ourselves in the mirror and see what we can improve on," said Giguere. "Everybody has something to improve and work on, and this is a good week to take a step back and go back to work rested. ...
"It's going to be nice to rest for a couple days -- just take a step back from hockey, enjoy your time with your family and don't even think about the game for a couple days. And come Wednesday, come ready, mentally and physically. We're going to have two practices before the next game, and they're going to be important practices."
Incidentally, the Ducks had just two four-day breaks between games last season. They won both games after those breaks: 2-1 at Edmonton on Dec. 27, and 3-1 vs. Calgary on Feb. 29.
Much needed: The Kings had been playing reasonably well, but had little to show for it.
So last week's 3-1 win over Florida -- ending a five-game losing streak and the first of consecutive wins going into tonight's game with Dallas at Staples Center -- probably had a bit more significance than the average early-November victory, at least in the mind of coach Terry Murray.
"Very important," said Murray. "(For) confidence, for the growth of the team, for them to believe real strongly in what it is we're doing."
A young team that's losing, he said, can "start to have a little doubt in 'Are we doing the right thing?'
"The only way they can evaluate their performance, because of their youth, is their own point statistics or a team win. If you come away at the end of the night and nothing has happened on the goals and assists, or we've lost, then you start to get afraid or nervous for the young guys, that they might lose their confidence. And then you're going to have to take some drastic measures, maybe taking them out of the lineup. And that's the last thing you want to do with young players."
One of those young players -- 18-year-old defenseman Drew Doughty -- agreed the win was much needed.
"We were a little frustrated losing those other games," he said. "We were losing them by one goal and stuff, and we were right there to win 'em. So tonight we came out hard and we took every opportunity. One of our main focuses was to get shots on net, and we did that, and the pucks were going in for us."
Games people play: The dressing room at the Kings' El Segundo practice facility has a new feature this year: A ping-pong table, which gets a good workout before and after practices.
Jarrett Stoll, who joined the team in the trade that sent Lubomir Visnovsky to Edmonton, was one of the players who lobbied for the table, along with Michal Handzus.
"We had it in Edmonton and had a lot of fun with it there," said Stoll, "and I think you do something or watch something together as a team, and it just gets you going a little bit before practice, and for some guys, it warms some guys up. Raitis (Ivanans), he sweats pretty good during the matches, so he gets going.
Yeah, me and Zus had kind of talked about, and a couple of other guys. I think Zus went to Dean (Lombardi, the general manager) and asked if it would be all right, and then Terry, and obviously it went through. So it's a good addition for sure. ...
"You get doubles going, you get teams going, and rankings and what not. And it's fun. It's fun to keep track, it's fun to jab guys here and there. It's just something that gets guys together a little bit."
Top players, he said, are Anze Kopitar, Ivanans and Derek Armstrong, with Doughty making inroads: "He's come out of the woodwork and he's one of the top-ranked players now."

Just in case anyone's checking ... between some required time off and being on-call for jury duty this week, no hockey notebook for now. It might pop up later in the week. Stay tuned.

Coaches like to preach that "You win as a team, and you lose as a team." While that's true enough, it was pretty clear that responsibility for Cal Lutheran's 24-21 loss to Occidental on Saturday was not evenly distributed on both sides of the ball.
"Occidental controlled the time of possession," said CLU coach Ben McEnroe. (The figure was 36:42 for Occidental, 23:18 for CLU.) "They picked up first downs." (The Tigers had 19, CLU 9.)
"We left our defense out there. When our offense went cold, not able to move the ball, we left our guys out there a long time.
"Our offensive guys have just got to play better. I don't think you can pin this game on anybody in particular on either side of the ball, but you've got to pull your own weight as an offensive football team, and we just didn't pull our weight today offensively."
CLU finished with 201 yards. Since the Kingsmen had a 65-yard touchdown pass from Jericho Toilolo to Danny Hernandez, and a 48-yard TD run by Bobby Rodrigues, that means their other 52 snaps produced 88 yards, or 1.7 yards per play.
Foreshadowing: CLU needed all of one play to see things weren't going to go too swimmingly. On the game's first snap, Toilolo was sacked (the first of six times), and the CLU lost both the ball -- with Occidental's Jesse Fischer recovering a fumble at the 33 -- and starting offensive lineman Jeff Werts (Newbury Park), who was injured and did not return.
Occidental's first possession proved to be something of a preview of coming attractions as well, both with that good field position, and the fact CLU's defense held. During a brief first-quarter downpour, the first pass attempt by Occidental quarterback Justin Gertz was picked off by Victor Edwards. It was the first of three interceptions for Edwards, as well as the first time this year Gertz had thrown an interception.
New starter: With CLU running backs Antoine Adams and Alex Gomez both sidelined by injuries, Rodrigues -- a freshman listed at 5-foot-7, 172 pounds -- made his first start at running back.
Before the game, McEnroe called him the team's "secret weapon" and "the fastest guy on the team." That speed showed on his 48-yard scoring run, when he squirted through the line of scrimmage and sprinted through the Occidental secondary, but the initial hole opened by the offensive line on that play was the exception, not the rule.
"With our defense," said McEnroe, "you get a lead, you've got to be able to run the football and take some time off the clock and establish a running game. And we just weren't able to block well enough to get any kind of a running game going today. ... Their defense stepped up and played their best game of the year, from what I saw."
CLU finished with 34 yards on 30 rushing attempts.
The playoff picture: CLU's remaining games are with La Verne and at Redlands. Occidental unquestionably is in the driver's seat for the SCIAC title. Even if CLU wins its remaining games and Occidental loses once in its remaining games, at home against Pomona-Pitzer and Whittier, the Tigers will have the head-to-head tiebreaker in their favor.
But, as defensive coordinator Scott Beattie said, the coaches will emphasize that the race isn't yet over, and there's always the possibility the Kingsmen could get an at-large berth in the NCAA Division III playoffs. The odds are against it, though
It's a 32-team field, and 23 conference champions receive automatic berths. Three more berths are set aside for teams chosen from a group known as Pool B -- independents or teams from conferences not large enough to receive an automatic bid -- leaving six at-large berths. Given that there were years, before the SCIAC had an automatic berth, that the conference champion was excluded, the odds of getting a second team aren't good. CLU's hopes would seem to rest mainly on the fact that its two losses are to ranked and undefeated teams: Willamette is 8-0 and ranked No. 11 by D3football.com; Occidental, 7-0, is ranked No. 20.