Now hear this
Stars send power message with 3rd straight win over Wings
Posted: Saturday December 19, 1998 01:36 AM
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In the crease: Red Wings' goalie Chris Osgood (30) stops the shot as the Stars' Jamie Langenbrunner (top) flies into the goal AP |
DETROIT (AP) -- It wasn't so long ago that the Dallas Stars couldn't buy a
win in Joe Louis Arena. Now they've won twice in five weeks with a
smothering defensive style that strongly suggests they could very well end
the Detroit Red Wings'
run of NHL supremacy.
Ed Belfour made 24 saves as Dallas beat the Red Wings 3-1 Friday
night, the Stars' third straight victory over the two-time defending
Stanley Cup champions.
While extending their own unbeaten streak to six (4-0-2), the Stars
ended Detroit's six-game home winning streak that started after Dallas beat
the Red Wings 5-1 on November 13. The Stars were just 1-17-2 in their
previous 20 visits to Detroit, including playoffs, before that.
Pat Verbeek, Jere Lehtinen and Brett Hull scored the Dallas goals, but
the Stars won the game with a defense that frustrated the Red Wings at
practically every turn.
"They're a great shooting team, so you want to take away the middle,
take away the neutral zone," Stars center Mike Modano said. "We've done
that the last three games. You don't see [Steve] Yzerman and [Sergei]
Fedorov have the whole neutral zone to carry the puck.
"We've been forcing them to dump it in, and they're not comfortable
doing that. They like to have possession of the puck coming in."
The Stars, who have one game remaining against the Red Wings, clinched
a season series over Detroit for just the second time in seven seasons.
They've outscored Detroit 11-4 in their three meetings thus far.
But Dallas coach Ken Hitchcock remembers that his team was seeded
ahead of Detroit in last year's playoffs before the Red Wings beat the
Stars in six games to take the Western Conference finals.
"It doesn't matter until the end of the season," Hitchcock said.
"Right now it's more for us than for them. They already know how to get
there. These wins are building blocks for us. We need them to gain
confidence."
The Red Wings just managed to avoid their second shutout loss in three
games when Vyacheslav Kozlov scored with 2:02 remaining.
That ruined Belfour's bid for his 43rd career shutout. He didn't have
many tough saves because his defense blocked a lot of shots in front of him
whenever Detroit managed to skate the puck into the Stars' zone.
"We had a game plan, but I guess we just didn't realize what we had to
do," Fedorov said. "They always had a player on our player whenever the
puck was in the neutral zone."
Detroit goalie Chris Osgood made 23 saves.
Verbeek scored the only goal of the first period, his seventh. Mike
Keane skated in from the right side and took a shot that glanced off Osgood
before it hit the right post and sat in the crease. Verbeek skated in from
the left side and easily poked the loose puck into the net at 7:04.
"[Tony] Hrkac and Verbeek have had real good chemistry, and two games
ago we put Keane on their line," Hitchcock said. "They play with position
and patience."
Lehtinen made it 2-0 with a third-period power-play goal 17 seconds
after McCarty was sent off for interference. Mike Sydor made a great pass
from the left point to Mike Modano in the right circle, then Lehtinen took
Modano's pass in the slot and beat Osgood at 3:17.
Hull scored with 5:44 remaining, triggering a mass exodus by the
capacity crowd. Those who left missed Kozlov's goal along with his ejection
on a game misconduct for elbowing Joe Nieuwendyk 14 seconds later.
"The last couple of years we've been a team that responds well to
challenges," Detroit's Brendan Shanahan said. "Now we've given ourselves
one with this team."
Copyright 2003 Associated Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten, or redistributed.
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