Stargazing: Dallas Stars Beat Devils, Move Quickly to Islanders

With the NHL (presumably) desiring a weekend heavy schedule for purposes of selling tickets and tv ratings, there isn't much time for most teams that got a big win last night (RE: Dallas Stars) to enjoy it as they must play back to back.

So the Stars move quickly to Long Island to face the Islanders tonight in THEIR home opener in front of another amped up crowd and a loud building against players who are chomping at the bit to start. If last night's frantic pace was any indication of how excited players are for the start of the season, the Stars could have a bit of trouble with the Islanders tonight if the atmosphere should repeat itself. Luckily the Stars confidence should be pretty high right now and there are no reports (as of this moment) of any injuries or tweaks from last night.

The Stars won 62 percent! of faceoffs last night. Show that to me again, please. We like that very much.

Let's get to the link and the quotes. We'll have a game preview a little later.

• Mike Modano scores from HIGH in the slot last night in his first game as a Wing. I thought Hiller should have had it. That's right...it's painful to watch Mike succeed there. [Detroit Free Press Talks all about it]
• Loui Eriksson gets love from Puck Daddy as the night's #1 Star for his perfectly placed ender last night. [Puck Daddy]
• Mark Stepneski offers his thoughts on the comeback last night. [ESPN]
• The Devils sound a lot like us last year: Trying to figure out they're going to play "wide open" and limit their mistakes. NJ.com explains.

"I think this is what it’s going to be," Brodeur said of the Devils’ style. "It felt wide open because of the excitement of the game. But guys didn’t have much room to make plays, especially in our zone.

"It was just little turnovers that we created. We had the puck behind the net, we lose it and they turn around and score. Little things like that we have to clean up in our game. If we want to play a little more up-tempo, we can’t give freebies." [NJ.com]

• The popular thing to say this morning seems to be that if Kovalchuk hadn't missed and hit the post to potentially make it 3-0, the Devils could have run away with it. [NJDevils.com]
• Mike Heika thinks this kind of crazy game could be exactly what the Stars needed. [Dallas Morning News]
• Fox Sports Southwest has video from some of the post-game locker room stuff if you look hard enough. [FSN]

Some quotes after the jump...

Most, if not all of these could be heard on Fox Sports Southwest. Credited otherwise.

Brad Richards:

"It wasn’t pretty at times, but we also gave them some trouble at times and it kind of equaled out," said Richards, "It was a fun game to be a part of, it went back and forth at times, maybe not what both coaches want, but it was a fun time for us and the fans."  

"We got off to a tough start there, but I think we kept into it and we battled back, I think it was a good job by us and it’s nice to get two points here tonight," said Eriksson, the club’s leading goal-scorer the previous two seasons. "It’s always nice to get the first win in the first game."

"We got a big win on the road, and we want to get that winning feeling, it’s kind of a contagious feeling and we didn’t have that for awhile around here. It’s a good feeling, we’re happy tonight, and we’ll try to carry it into tomorrow."

Kari Lehtonen:

"I certainly didn’t get the start that I wanted, an easy goal to start it, and then they got a 2-0 lead, but it was great to see our guys kept going and when I was having a hard time, they picked it up," said Lehtonen, "and then in the last period, New Jersey got more chances, but my game started going better at that point.  It was great to see that the guys helped me out there."

Loui Eriksson refers to himself in the third person:

"The first one was a good job by Richie and Nealer to get the puck to net and I was there on the rebound. It was a typical Loui goal, I think," Eriksson said. "The second one was two against one and I was just able to put it in. I wanted to pass first, but they took it away and I had to shoot. It was a good shot."

Marc Crawford:

"A huge comeback win for us. Great character and great leadership. Our leaders really led the way. Brenden Morrow was great, Ribeiro was great, Robidas was great, Richards was great and of course Loui Eriksson scoring the two goals, it was huge for us that we stuck with how we were playing in that we battled and we played with intensity. I give our leaders credit. They were very committed to do the things they had to do. I thought there were periods where we dominated. It was an overall team win."

"For us, I thought the biggest turning point in the game was the post that Kovalchuk hit," Crawford said. "And we ended up coming down a couple of shifts later, and Brenden and Ribeiro made a great play to score the goal."

As great as Loui's goal was...as great as the Neal pass to Richards was...that Morrow goal really saved the whole night. They needed it badly at the time.