Having managed to complete a demanding and largely disappointing five-game road swing that bridged Christmas with a break-even, 2-2-1 record, the Ducks will play seven of their next eight games at home.

The stretch begins with a New Year's Eve special Wednesday night against the Columbus Blue Jackets at Honda Center, and the lone road game until mid-January is merely up the freeway at Los Angeles on Jan. 8.

The key question for the Ducks is whether their having salvaged a 4-3 victory Sunday night at St. Louis marked the beginning of a significant turnaround for a team that had lost three consecutive games and gone just 2-4-1 since Dec. 11.

Having once again seen a lead get away, actually two of them, against the Blues, the Ducks have now blown seven leads in the past five games. On the latest such occasion, however, the Ducks responded, overcoming a 3-2, third-period deficit on the strength of a goal by light-scoring defenseman Steve Montador and a power-play strike from red-hot rookie winger Bobby Ryan.

"They're all big for us these days," captain Scott Niedermayer said, analyzing the importance of the victory. "We're not getting as many as we would like. We came off a game last night (in Dallas) that we felt we probably gave away.

"We wanted to finish up the road trip with a good effort, and I thought we did. It's nice to get rewarded. It (the trip) could have been worse, but we thought we could have been better."

DUCKS 4, BLUES 3: After seeing 1-0 and 2-1 leads get away, and falling behind 3-2 when St. Louis winger Brad Boyes scored a power-play goal early in the third period, the Ducks responded. Defenseman Steve Montador scored only 37 seconds after Boyes had given the Blues the lead, and rookie winger Bobby Ryan struck for the game-winner on the power play at 12:49. The Ducks also received goals from Rob Niedermayer and Scott Niedermayer, who added an assist. Ryan Getzlaf chipped in two assists, and goaltender Jonas Hiller stopped 27 shots, including a good one by David Backes from the low slot in the waning seconds.