If Jamie Benn was feeling fatigued after helping Canada win gold at the Sochi Olympics and making the long trip back to Texas, he didn't show it Thursday night. Benn scored a shorthanded goal and had two assists to lead the Dallas Stars to a 4-1 victory against the Carolina Hurricanes night at American Airlines Center. It was Benn's first game since helping Canada win the gold medal by beating Sweden on Sunday. He helped the Stars get off to a fast start by assisting on two goals in the first 6:13 as Dallas (28-21-10) regained the second wild-card berth in the Western Conference. The Stars found the back of the net on their first two shots. Tyler Seguin beat Carolina goaltender Anton Khudobin to the short side with a one-timer from the left circle 3:18 into the game after a backhand cross-ice pass from Valeri Nichushkin.
"I thought our team played great,"
Benn said. "We came out in the first and I thought we took it
to them. We got the first goal and we kept rolling from there."
"I thought [Nichushkin] skated really
well, and he had a nice set-up on the first goal," Stars
coach Lindy Ruff said.
Dallas doubled the lead at 6:13 when Brenden
Dillon scored his sixth of the season, firing with a wrister from
the high slot over Khudobin's glove for a shorthanded goal. Carolina
was on the power play after Cody
Eakin was called for delay of game at 4:57 for shooting the puck
over the boards.
"Anytime Jamie
Benn is going up the ice, you've got to expect a goal,"
Dillon said.
Carolina coach Kirk Muller was less than pleased
with his team's slow start. "You know we weren't happy with
our first period tonight. When you give a team like that the
opportunity and advantage, it's hard to come back and for whatever
reason we didn't have enough guys ready to go to start this game and
we just chased things after that."
Carolina center Elias
Lindholm, who returned after being a healthy scratch Tuesday
night in Buffalo, agreed with his coach that he and his teammates
weren't ready to play. "I don't think we were ready to go
from the beginning. In the third, we started playing a little bit
better, but it was too late," Lindholm said.
The Hurricanes lost forward Alexander
Semin for the rest of the game after he sustained a lower-body
injury during his first shift of the second period. Semin will be
evaluated on Friday. Muller said losing one of his team's hottest
scorers made chasing the game even harder. "It's tough
because he's been our hottest forward in the last 15-20 games. He's a
big part of this team and we miss that firepower from him."
Benn gave Dallas a three-goal lead by scoring a
shorthanded goal with 1:25 left in second period. The Stars' captain
gained possession deep in his own end after Carolina's Nathan
Gerbe fanned on an attempted pass. He raced up the middle of the
ice and split defensemen Andrej
Sekera and Justin
Faulk before firing a wrister under an outstretched Khudobin near
the far post for his 23rd goal of the season.
"On the whole I thought we skated well. We
executed for the most part," Ruff said. "I'd give
our team an A-plus tonight, for their skating, their compete level
and being able to get down in the trenches."
The Stars scored two shorthanded goals in a game
for the first time since an 8-2 win over the San Jose Sharks in
Dallas on March 16, 2010.
"We really very seldom get scored on the
power play. It's a couple of mistakes early on that cost us,"
Muller said. "We gave them those first couple of goals and
like I said you've got to fight back after that."
Carolina got on the board 2:42 into the final
period when Eric
Staal fired a wrister from along the goal line to the right of
Lehtonen that deflected off his left pad and into the net for Staal's
16th of the season. It was the only Carolina shot to beat Lehtonen,
who finished with 29 saves.
"I was thinking what kind of passing
options he had from the corner," Lehtonen said. "I
think he sensed that. I was looking up the ice."
Eakin hit the empty net with 56 seconds remaining.
Dallas' Antoine
Roussel earned a charging major and a game misconduct at 5:36 of
the third period after going hard into Khudobin. Carolina's Ron
Hainsey earned an instigating minor, a fighting major and a
10-minute misconduct after dropping the gloves with Roussel. Khudobin
made 30 saves for the Hurricanes (26-24-9), who have lost the first
two games of a five-game trip that continues against the Los Angeles
Kings on Saturday, the same day Dallas hosts the Tampa Bay Lightning.
"He's an elite goalie," Muller said of
Khudobin. "He's doing the job every night. He gave us the
chance again to stay in this game. He made some huge saves."
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