NHL - Dallas Stars @ Winnipeg Jets 5-3 - Tuesday, February 02, 2016

The Dallas Stars face a challenging schedule in February, and they got off to a good start, defeating the Winnipeg Jets, 5-3, Tuesday night at MTS Centre.
Playing their first game since the All-Star break, the Stars snapped an eight-game road losing streak with Tuesday’s win in Winnipeg and got off to a good start in February after winning just three of eleven games in January. The road win was big for a team that didn’t win once on the road in January and plays eight of its first 11 games in February away from home.
Tyler Seguin scored two goals and Klingberg had one goal and one assist. Vernon Fiddler and Antoine Roussel also scored goals. Antti Niemi stopped 21 of 24 shots and made several huge stops at key times in the game. Special teams, which had been a sore spot in January, came up big for the Stars. Seguin scored once on the power play, and his other goal came just as a power play was expiring.
The Stars, who overcame 1-0 and 2-1 deficits Tuesday, have won two straight games and three of their past four games. The Stars, whose first five games out of the break are against the tough Central Division, improved to 9-4-1 against their division foes.
Winnipeg lost for the sixth time in its last eight home games (2-6-0). The Jets had a 2-1 lead but gave up two goals late in the second period to fall behind 3-2. One of those goals came on a 3-on-0 rush. The Jets cashed in on the game’s first power play to take a 1-0 lead when Stafford scored off a blast from the left circle at the 14:16 mark of the first period. Seguin scored off a one-timer just after a Dallas power play expired to tie the game 1-1 at the 51-second mark of the second period. The goal ended a four-game goal scoring drought for Seguin. Just after the Stars missed on their third power play of the night, the Jets scored to take a 2-1 lead. Adam Lowry scored during a scramble in front of Niemi at 4:41 of the second period.
The Jets had several chances to extend their lead to 3-1. Bryan Little fired wide on a breakaway. Niemi turned away a breakaway bid by Andrew Copp. Little had a point-blank chance, but Niemi came up with a big stop. The Stars drew even late in the period and just after killing off a Winnipeg power play. Jason Demers came out of the box and set up Klingberg on a 3-on-0 rush and Klingberg scored from close range to make it a 2-2 game at the 14:41 mark.
Just two minutes later, the Stars took a 3-2 lead when Valeri Nichushkin and Ales Hemsky set up Fiddler, who scored off the rush at the 16:52 mark.
Seguin extended the lead to 4-2 with a power-play goal at 2:49 of the third period, scoring from the slot off a broken play. Winnipeg cut the lead to 4-3 when Dustin Byfuglien scored off a blast at the 10:14 mark.
The Jets had a great chance to tie with 4:14 left, but Niemi got his pad on a point-blank shot by Mark Scheifele. In the final minute, with the Winnipeg net empty and an extra attacker on the ice, Jets defenseman Tyler Myers had a great look from the slot, but hit the crossbar with 46 seconds left. Roussel then scored into the empty net to put the Stars up 5-3 and seal the victory.

Stars Quotes

John Klingberg: “This was a big win for us because we’d been struggling on the road before the break. It’s a good way to start after the break.”
Tyler Seguin: “Getting a couple power play goals makes a huge difference. It wasn’t great last month, so we were happy with that tonight. You're going to have a harder shot on a one-timer. It felt pretty good. I put January behind me during my time in Nashville. Personally, I thought it was one of my worst months as a pro. I think we all came out of this break a little more refreshed. We started the year saying we had three big points: how we play at home, our start to the year, and how we play against our division. This was a good start."
Lindy Ruff: “This is huge. We get the first one, and now we move onto the next one. Coming out of the break you don’t know what to expect, and we got a pretty good effort out of our guys.”
"It's real important. We talked this morning about starting fresh. I thought his one-on-one play, his battle, was a lot better. It all starts there. And I thought he had some really good looks on the power play."
"Coming out of the break, you don't know what to expect, and I thought we got a pretty good effort out of our guys. I thought both goalies made some great saves. I said after the first period, 'We have to risk a little bit more.' I thought after that we were pretty good."

Jets Quotes

Drew Stafford: “They were just harder on the puck than we were. They won more battles. There were a couple turnovers on our end, some sloppy play, some sloppy reads. You can’t be giving up 2-on-0’s, 3-on-0’s. … You get into a track meet with them, they have such a great transition, and it paid off for them.”

News

* Stars forward Colton Sceviour left Tuesday’s game in the third period with an undisclosed injury. Sceviour was hit hard into the boards early in the second period by Jets defenseman Dustin Byfuglien, who received a boarding minor. Sceviour, whose head hit the boards, came back and played two more shifts in the second and then four in the third before leaving the game.
“He came back and was feeling OK. Then he wasn’t feeling good halfway through the third, so he left the game,” said Stars coach Lindy Ruff.
* Defenseman Jordie Benn was activated off injured reserve Tuesday but did not play. Ruff said Benn, who has been out with a lower-body injury, could use some more practice time. Benn could play Thursday at Colorado.

Stats

*The Stars outshot the Jets 27-24 and had a 55-47 advantage in attempted shots.
*Tyler Seguin led the Stars with five shots on goal and 12 attempted shots.
*Seguin’s goals were his 26th and 27th of the season.
*John Klingberg and Alex Goligoski both were a plus-four in the game.
*Goligoski led the Stars with 26:57 of ice time. Klingberg was second with 25:06.
*The Stars were 1-4 on the power play and 2-3 on the penalty kill.
*The Stars won 26 of 48 faceoffs (54 percent).
*Cody Eakin won 11 of 18 faceoffs (61 percent). Tyler Seguin won 5 of 8 (63 percent). Jason Spezza won 5 of 9 (56 percent).

Next Up

The Stars wrap up their two-game road trip Thursday in Denver, taking on the Colorado Avalanche. The Stars have lost eight straight games to the Avalanche and 11 of the last 12.

Stars Line Up

Jamie Benn – Tyler Seguin – Patrick Sharp
Mattias Janmark – Jason Spezza – Patrick Eaves
Antoine Roussel – Cody Eakin – Ales Hemsky
Valeri Nichushkin – Vernon Fiddler – Colton Sceviour

Alex Goligoski – John Klingberg
Johnny Oduya – Jason Demers
Jyrki Jokipakka – Jamie Oleksiak

Antti Niemi
Kari Lehtonen

Scratched: Jordie Benn, Travis Moen, Patrik Nemeth
Injured: None

Dallas Local Press

In one of the more bizarre games of the season, Dallas took a 5-3 victory over the Winnipeg Jets on Tuesday night and ended their All-Star break in solid fashion. The game included the rare three-on-none goal, a shot from Tyler Seguin that was so fast that officials didn't at first see it go in, and a 21-save performance by Antti Niemi that ranked among his best performances of the season. All in all, these were the Stars we got used to in the first three months of the season. Yes, they were risk-takers, but they fell on the right side of the risk.
Seguin was at the center of the game, scoring two goals and breaking out of one of the worst slumps of his career. He had just three points in 11 January games and was looking for some jump after participating in the NHL All-Star Game on Sunday. He got it in the form of a blinding shot in the second period.
With Dallas on the power play to start the period, John Klingberg found Seguin alone in the right circle. Just as the power play was expiring, Seguin unleashed his one-timer, blasting a shot past Connor Hellebuyck that officials didn't realize had gone in the net. The puck came out so fast, the goal light didn't go on.
Seguin registered 95 mph in the hardest-shot competition during the All-Star weekend in Nashville, so what does he think that one was?
That goal was important for a lot of reasons. One, it showed that the Stars' power play could be effective. While it wasn't officially a power-play goal, the man-advantage unit moved the puck and scored. Two, it clearly was a huge weight off the back of Seguin, who later scored on the power play for what would prove to be the game-winner.
And while the game wasn't pretty, it was better than the slump. Cody Eakin made a great play on the penalty kill to punch a puck forward and start a three-on-none that was capped by Klingberg. Vernon Fiddler tallied a goal off a pretty tick-tack-toe play from Valeri Nichushkin and Ales Hemsky. And Niemi came up with some huge saves while still allowing three goals. Niemi started his fourth game in a row and has gone 3-1-0 in that stretch.
The Stars moved to 32-14-5 (69 points), putting more pressure on the Blackhawks and Blues and starting a stretch of five games against Central Division foes on the right foot. Dallas is 9-4-1 against the Central.