Well, the guys looked much better tonight, and no this wasn’t all about a new goalie in Tobias Stephan working like a brick wall.

Everyone stepped up in all three zones and played with tenacity and hunger.  This is how Dallas Stars hockey is supposed to look.

Performance nods go to some usual suspects in Brendan Morrow and Mike Ribeiro which is good, because you want your star players to show up every game.

Brad Richards looked especially good this game as well.  He was really flying around the ice tonight and seemed to be involved in every play.  Plus, he was really pulling the trigger tonight with a rather large number of shots on goal.

Welcome back Steve Ott; we missed you.  Steve always makes the game more fun to watch and I love it when he scores a goal.  I think he may have put a hit on every one of the Wild players on the ice tonight.  I guess he was making up for lost time.

The Dallas Stars forwards out-worked and out-hustled the Minnesota Wild.  They seemed to really give the Wild some trouble with their fore-check and some fantastic offensive zone turnovers led to great scoring chances and a couple of goals.

Dallas’ defense-men looked solid and in sync throughout the entire game.  When the Wild did get manage to get a breakaway the back-checking forwards were there to break it up.

Tobias Stephan looked solid, at times, in his first game this season (only his second NHL start).  He was noticeably nervous/shaky in the beginning with a few questionable passes and a misstep behind the net.  His nerves did seem to get under control after a while and I don’t think anyone is going to fault him for either of the goals tonight.  The first one was a blister of a slapshot that may have had the speed to break the sound barrier.  The second?  Still not sure exactly what happened with that fluky goal.  So, not a bad seasonal debut for the young netminder.

By the way, I love teaming Steve Ott and Sean Avery on the same line with Brad Richards.  Seriously?!  Which opponent line is going to volunteer to go against that trio?  “Gee coach, I think I’d like to play against two obscenely abrasive checking power forwards that consistently crash the net and try to check anything moving not in a Dallas Stars jersey.  Don’t worry, I’ll try not to forget about the precision passing center with an accurate shot.  Put me in coach, I’m ready to play.”

Welcome back Ott.

Facing the league leading New York Rangers the Stars I expect to see every night finally arrived. The mistakes that were consistently present throughout the first 5 games were limited. The effort, previously missing, reappeared and the Stars won many of the puck battles. Perhaps more telling was the lack of turnovers that caused most of the problems.

This game did not look good after the opening minute. Loui Eriksson took a tripping penalty 25 seconds into the game and New York quickly scored on the ensuing power play. My first thought was here we go again. Although New York carried much of the play in the first period, the team seemed to respond much better than in the previous games. Morrow tied the game on a second period power play goal with rookie phenom Fabian Brunnstrom getting the primary assist. The ageless wonder that is Mike Modano netted his 87th game winning goal in the third period.

It appears as if the team is starting to gel and maybe this road trip is just what the doctor ordered. The next few days will tell. Which Stars personality will show up at game time, the confused and listless Stars of the previous 5 games or the cohesive unit fighting each shift for every inch of ice?