How long wil Kovalchuk’s scoring drought last?

Ilya Kovalchuk shot and shot and shot. He tried little flips of the wrist. He used different angles. He aimed left, right and between the goalie’s legs.

And yes, the puck went in the net.

Now, if only Kovalchuk can make that happen in a game. And soon.

The Thrashers’ two-time 52-goal scorer hasn’t scored outside of practice since Dec. 12. He has gone eight games without a goal, matching the longest previous droughts of his career.

So on Monday, when he could have been standing around waiting for his line’s turn to run a team drill, Kovalchuk used his rest breaks to go one-on-one against Johan Hedberg. If it was possible to practice his way out of his slump, Kovalchuk was determined to do it.

One night earlier, he seemed on the verge of scoring when a pass from Bryan Little headed toward him as he rushed to the net. At the last second, though, a defenseman blocked the pass with an outstretched stick. The puck did go in the net, but Little, the last Thrashers player to touch it, got the credit. Surely, Kovalchuk would have scored if the puck had reached him?

“With my luck right now probably not,” he said.

That’s the problem he says he sees: bad luck. He’s still getting chances, he said, just not getting results. He says being limited to 11 goals through 36 games hasn’t shaken his faith in himself and his ability.

“I just have to do the same things I always do,” Kovalchuk said. “You can’t forget how to score in one summer. You should just do the same thing you usually do and work a little harder.”

“I don’t know anything more that I can do as a coach to get him those opportunities to score,” Anderson said. “I think he’s trying. I think he’s probably trying a little bit too hard right now. That’s only a natural human reaction when things aren’t going your way.

“He’s getting chances, and that’s probably the most frustrating part, because usually he scores on them. His skill level’s still there. It hasn’t disappeared. It’s just the results aren’t there.”

Anderson can empathize. He scored 30 or more goals in four consecutive NHL seasons and knows what it’s like when the shots that usually go in aren’t.

“It seems like every time you shoot you don’t score. What you do is you think too much, and/or you don’t shoot, you pass,” he said. “You don’t have that natural rhythm and smoothness and freeness of mind. Hopefully, he’ll get it back. It’s just getting a little mentally tougher and going from there.”

Kovalchuk had no shots on net in the first two games of his slump. He has put 22 on net over the last six games. That’s higher than his season average, but it’s not producing goals. He does have five assists during the goal-less streak, but that’s not what the Thrashers need from him.

“We desperately need him to score,” Anderson said. “That’s the one intangible that’s very hard to explain to people, how hard it is to be a superstar, because sometimes you do have to load the team up on your back.

“When things aren’t going your way, you’re responsible, and it gets worse, and you make it worse on yourself. It’s a very difficult thing to come out of.”