Stars News and Notes: Key week ahead

Sunday, February 07, 2010-11:52:pm
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It's only early February and it's only three games, but the upcoming road trip that will take the Dallas Stars into the Olympic break is a key a stretch.

"It's pretty much our most important of the year, I'll give you that," Stars coach Marc Crawford said of his team's upcoming trip.

The Stars, who are in 10th place and just four points out of a playoff spot, will take on three teams current sitting in the playoffs and they'll be playing them on the road, where they are 1-10-2 in their last 13 games. In order to keep pace in the race, the Stars will need to collect some points on this trip.

They've done the job at home, winning 10 of their last 12 at American Airlines Center and posting a 15-3-2 record since November 21. But since that great run at home started, the Stars are 2-12-3 on the road and that's adding up to a 17-15-5 record overall.

"We need to win more than two games in a row and we've got to take it on the road," Stars captain Brenden Morrow said on The Ticket's postgame show Saturday night. "We've got a good test here with the last three before the 12 break for some guys, so hopefully we can pour it on these last three."

The first game of the trip - Tuesday in Chicago against the Blackhawks - will be a big test. Chicago's one of the top teams in the West and the league.

"We're scratching and clawing on the road, and we've got three huge ones coming up and a huge one in Chicago," said Stars goalie Marty Turco. "I can't say how big it is to go in there, a tough game, to collect points, but we have to."

Thursday it's on to Calgary, one of the teams the Stars are currently battling for that final playoff spot in the conference. And then the final game is on Saturday against Phoenix, a team they've seen twice recently and a team that currently ranks 5th in the West.

The road trip

At Chicago (Tuesday)
The Blackhawks will be coming off a 2-1 win over St. Louis on Saturday that snapped a season-high three-game losing streak (0-2-1). Coach Joel Quenneville reunited the line of Jonathan Toews, Patrick Kane and Patrick Sharp and those three produced both goals in the game. RW Adam Burish (ACL) is the team's one key injury. The Stars are 2-0-0 against the Blackhawks this season.
At Calgary (Thursday)
The Flames are 3-1-1 in their last five games, including 2-1-1 since GM Darryl Sutter pulled off a major roster shakeup that saw defenseman Dion Phaneuf and center Olli Jokinen moved out of town. The Flames have allowed one regulation goal in four of their last five games. Calgary will wrap up a three game road trip Tuesday in Ottawa and then return home to take on the Stars Thursday.
At Phoenix (Saturday)
The Coyotes, who saw a six-winning streak end with Saturday's 4-0 loss to the Stars, will have a busy week leading up to next Saturday's rematch with the Stars. They host Edmonton Monday, play at Minnesota Wednesday and then take on the Avalanche in Denver on Friday. The game against the Stars will be the tail end of the a back-to-back and their fourth game in six nights. Phoenix has scored one goal in its last three games.

Stars notes

  • The Stars had Sunday off. They'll practice Monday morning in Frisco and then head off to Chicago to start the three-game road trip.
     

  • The Stars assigned C Warren Peters back to the Texas Stars of the AHL on Sunday.

Points pace race

For the third straight week the points pace for the eighth and final playoff spot in the Western Conference playoff is sitting at about 93 points. The current pace is being set by Calgary, which picked up its pace slightly over the last week by picking up five of eight points (2-1-1).

The Stars, who picked up four of six points (2-1-0), saw their points pace increase from 88 to 89.

For the Stars to hit 93 points they would have to go six games over .500 in their final 24 games. That would be a record of 15-9-0, 14-8-2, 13-7-4, etc.

To hit 94 points, they would need to be seven games over .500 in the final 24 games. That would take a record of 15-8-1, 14-7-3, 13-6-5, etc.

Here's a look at Western Conference teams, their points pace and how they've changed over the past week. Teams are ranked with the division leaders getting the top three spots.

RK Team GP W L OTL PTS PTS% PTS% Pace 1 Wk ago Diff
1 San Jose 58 38 11 9 85 .733 120.2 120.7 -0.5
2 Chicago 58 38 15 5 81 .698 114.5 116.3 -1.8
3 Vancouver 57 35 20 2 72 .632 103.6 106.3 -2.7
4 Los Angeles 58 36 19 3 75 .647 106.1 102.9 +3.2
5 Phoenix 59 35 19 5 75 .636 104.3 104.0 +0.3
6 Colorado 57 32 19 6 70 .614 100.7 100.2 +0.5
7 Nashville 57 31 22 4 66 .579 95.0 95.6 -0.6
8 Calgary 59 29 21 9 67 .568 93.2 92.5 +0.7
9 Detroit 58 27 21 10 64 .552 90.5 92.5 -2.0
10 Dallas 58 26 21 11 63 .543 89.1 88.0 +1.1
11 Minnesota 58 29 25 4 62 .534 87.6 86.4 +1.2
12 Anaheim 58 27 24 7 61 .526 86.3 85.0 +1.3
13 St. Louis 58 25 24 9 59 .509 83.5 85.0 -1.5
14 Columbus 60 24 27 9 57 .475 77.9 76.3 +1.4
15 Edmonton 57 18 33 6 42 .368 60.4 58.7 +1.7