The visiting Dallas Stars lose 3-2
After back-to-back shutout losses, Stone’s goal provides winning edge against Stars
This night was about redemption for the Senators.
And thankfully, Mark Stone came through in the crunch and Chris Kelly came through from the bench.
The Senators ended their two-game losing skid Thursday as Stone scored the third-period winner to give Ottawa a 3-2 victory over the Dallas Stars in front of 17,676 at the Canadian Tire Centre.
After being outscored 10-0 in losses to the Buffalo Sabres on Saturday and the St. Louis Blues on Tuesday, the Senators were able to make sure they weren’t shut out in three straight games for the first time in franchise history.
It was the Senators’ first win at home against Dallas since Dec. 20, 2008.
Defenceman Dion Phaneuf, marking the one-year anniversary of his trade to the Senators, scored, and Kelly was credited with one after the Stars scored on their own net. Only Jamie Benn and Antoine Roussel were able to beat Ottawa goalie Mike Condon.
This was a bit of a strange night.
The Senators were being outplayed and outshot in the first period when Phaneuf scored the opening goal, his seventh of the season, with 5:19 left. That came short-handed and ended a scoring drought that had lasted a span of 135:06, and later in the period he dropped the gloves with Benn.
Late in the period, with Dallas goalie Kari Lehtonen pulled for a delayed Ottawa penalty, the Stars’ Jiri Hudler, while trying to make a pass backward near centre ice, put it in his own net at 17:55, giving the Senators a 2-0 lead they couldn’t hold.
Dallas blueliners Dan Hamhuis and John Klingberg couldn’t get back in time to stop the puck from going into the empty net. Kelly, who wasn’t even on the ice, got credit for the goal as the last Ottawa player to touch the puck.
“No shots, no pluses and a goal,” Kelly said with a smile.
It was his third goal of the season.
I thought it was a really good bounce-back game for us. … I thought we really did a good job sticking with it and it was a character win.
So was he on the bench? “Oh yeah, I thought the (defenceman) was going to get it, but then I think realized I’m not getting it so he kind of stopped,” Kelly added. “Actually, I do remember touching it because Patrick Sharp had it and I remember putting my stick out to force him back and got the puck and pushed it back.
“I think that’s when it happened.”
You don’t see goals like that very often.
“That second goal, it almost happened to us in Buffalo, but sometimes you get the breaks you deserve. We’ll take it and not ask any questions about it,” said Condon, who made 31 stops.
In the second period, not long after being involved in a skirmish with Mike Hoffman and Chris Wideman that ended with no penalties for either team, Roussel got on the board when he was left all alone in front and fired it by Condon on the glove side at 11:28 to pull the Stars to within a goal.
While the Senators had built up the two-goal lead, they were living dangerously and Benn tied it up 2-2 at 16:09 of the second to make the third period interesting. After the Senators pushed to extend their lead he fired a shot through a crowd that beat Condon, who couldn’t see it.
It took Stone’s 19th goal of the season, on a wraparound with 13:57 left in the third, to secure the win. It came when the puck bounced off the side of the net and Stone was able to beat Lehtonen on the stick side.
The timing couldn’t have been better because the Senators had been on their heels.
“As a whole those last two games weren’t our best, especially offensively, but I think throughout the game we started to dictate the pace better,” Stone said. “I think going down the stretch, all four lines are getting a little more zone (time) and you can kind of wear them down a little.”
The Senators got the win and the key was holding Dallas to 0-for-6 on the power play, but they’ve got work to do because they went 0-for-3 themselves. It was the third straight game they’ve been held scoreless with the man advantage.
“I thought it was a really good bounce-back game for us,” Phaneuf said. “The game had a little bit of everything. It was a good game, but I thought we really did a good job sticking with it and it was a character win.
“The bottom line is we were able to stick with it and we found a way to win. We didn’t feel good about ourselves after the last game and that goes without saying. We found a way to respond and we did a great job.”
The Senators host the New York Islanders in a rare afternoon game Saturday at 1 p.m.