Ducks Can’t Crack Stars’ Defensive Shell

The Dallas Stars brought their joyless brand of hockey to the Arrowhead Pond, putting the Mighty Ducks and an announced crowd of 13,684 souls into a comatose state from which the final buzzer was their only escape.

The Stars excel at playing the dullest style since the invention of ice and they did it again Wednesday in subduing the Ducks, 5-3. Dallas ventured nearly nothing, but gained another victory.

“When they get the lead they are a difficult team to play against,” Duck winger Paul Kariya said. “It’s a different game when you get the lead against them. Then they have to open it up.”

No such luck Wednesday. The Ducks trailed, 1-0, 3-1 and 4-2 en route to their first loss in six games.

“They didn’t chase us this time,” defenseman Oleg Tverdovsky said of the Stars. “They sent one guy in [the attacking zone] and had four guys waiting for us in the neutral zone. We didn’t do a good job of chipping the puck into the zone. Turnovers in the neutral zone killed us.”

Dallas scored twice on the power play and added a slap shot from the point through traffic to build a 3-1 lead early in the second period. When the Ducks drew close in the final period, the Stars capitalized on a couple of goalmouth scrambles.

Otherwise, the Stars were content to retreat into a defensive shell and stay there.

Just what you would expect from the defending Stanley Cup champions, right? A good night of neutral-zone trapping.

The Montreal Canadiens of the 1970s and ‘80s proved you can make strong defensive hockey exciting. Maybe someone could do Dallas Coach Ken Hitchcock a favor and send him an old videotape of Les Habs.

“We’ve played like this for a month now,” Hitchcock said. “We keep coming at you and coming at you.”

Well, around the net anyway. Give the Stars credit. They’re good at making opponents pay for their mistakes.

Tverdovsky lost control of the puck, Dallas’ Guy Carbonneau crashed into goalie Guy Hebert and Sergei Zubov scored into the empty net for a 4-2 lead 2:53 into the third period. Carbonneau was ruled to have been pushed into Hebert by a Duck and the goal was not nullified.

“I wish somebody from the league would clarify the goalie interference rule for me,” Duck Coach Craig Hartsburg said.

Later, after Kariya scored to trim the deficit to 4-3 at 11:53, Jamie Langenbrunner swatted a loose puck past Hebert for the back-breaking goal at 15:39.

Mike Keane made the play happen, swiping a loose puck in the neutral zone and racing on net. Keane failed to get off a shot, but the puck went off the skate of a Duck to Langenbrunner, who tapped it home.

Amid the mucking, grinding, clutching, grabbing and trapping, Kariya scored his 200th NHL goal on a textbook give and go with right wing Teemu Selanne.

Kariya, on the left wing, slipped Selanne the puck below the goal line. Kariya then moved into the slot, accepted a return pass and beat Ed Belfour to trim the Duck deficit to 4-3.

Finally, there was energy and emotion in the building. Too bad the entire game wasn’t played at the same tempo.

Of course, this does not absolve the Ducks for their part in Wednesday’s snooze-fest. The Ducks showed flashes of the passion that enabled them to compile a five-game unbeaten streak (3-0-2) before Wednesday.

But that’s all they were, flashes.

The Ducks seemed to catch a break when Dallas’ Brett Hull went to the dressing room with a broken nose, the result of an accidental high stick from Duck Jeff Nielsen midway through the first period.

Fredrik Olausson scored a power-play goal when Hull was whistled for obstruction hooking against Nielsen.

Hull is scheduled to undergo surgery today in Dallas and is expected to be sidelined for two games.