ROOKIE PULLS TRICK ON DUCKS WASHINGTON 3, DUCKS 2 (OT).

Byline: A.J. Perez Staff Writer

ANAHEIM - His arms outstretched over his head, rookie sensation Alex Ovechkin fell in front of the near boards after slipping the puck past Ducks goalie Jean-Sebastien Giguere in the second period.

Replays showed that he merely lost an edge and fell forward. But to the naked eye, it appeared that the 20-year-old Russian winger was doing his best Superman impression.

And why not? Ovechkin's heroics resulted in his first career hat trick as the Capitals came away with a 3-2 overtime victory - Washington's first win of any kind this month - in front of 16,186 at the Pond on Friday night.

``We got beat by a very special player tonight,'' Ducks coach Randy Carlyle said. ``He did everything he had to do to dominate the game in the goal-scoring department. He was a force out there at all times. ... He's the real deal.''

Ovechkin looked like anything but a rookie as he broke in from the blue line along the far boards in overtime. Defenseman Francois Beauchemin kept Ovechkin in front of him, but the barrier only proved to be a detriment to Giguere.

As Ovechkin reached the center of the face-off circle, he let go of forehand that squeaked through the legs of both Beauchemin and Giguere at 3:04. The goal, his rookie-leading 30th, was also the Caps' first in OT this season.

``We wanted this game after we lost six in a row. We needed this,'' said Ovechkin, referring to six-game the Caps (14-24-5) entered town with.

More surprising than Ovechkin reaching a milestone in his young career was the Ducks' inability to solve Brent Johnson, who filled in for the resting Olaf Kolzig. He entered with a gruesome .862 save percentage, a 2-5-0 record and not a whole lot of confidence.

That changed when he stopped Ducks rookie Corey Perry with two spectacular saves in the first. In between, he kicked away what looked to be a sure goal off the stick of Travis Moen.

The Ducks (19-16-8) cracked him in the second with relatively weak goals by Joffrey Lupul and Moen, the latter tying the score at 2 with 2:16 left in the period.

But Johnson shined in the third and in overtime, where he robbed Lupul with a stellar pad save in the first minute.

``We created a lot of chances,'' Carlyle said. ``We had 24 or 25 scoring chances to their 14, by our count.''

--Notes: With half the season to play, Ovechkin is two goals from surpassing Bob Carpenter (1981-82) in goals scored by Washington rookies. His 55 points is 12 shy of the all-time team scoring mark, which is also set by Carpenter. ... Forward Rob Niedermayer missed his fourth game since suffering a concussion on Jan. 1 against Nashville. He's expected to resume off-ice workouts as soon as this weekend and could return to practice as early as next week.

A.J. Perez, [phone]

a.j.perez(at)presstelegram.com