by MIKE HEIKA, Staff Writer mheika@dallasnews.com , THE DALLAS MORNING NEWS

Battling to find some kind of rhythm on home ice, Dallas looked lost for half the game. But the Stars finally emerged with a 4-3 overtime victory against the Toronto Maple Leafs. The ending was frenetic, as James Neal shoveled in a rebound goal with 2:03 remaining in the extra period to give Dallas its first overtime win of the year.

"Any tight game ... that's the type of Hockey you want to play in the playoffs," said defenseman Stephane Robidas, who assisted on the game-winning goal. "They were trying to slow the game down, and we really couldn't generate much speed. But the good thing is, we stuck with it and came back."

The Stars (6-2-4) are 2-2-1 on home ice. This was the first in a stretch of four out of five games at home, and the Stars said one of their goals was to start making AAC a tough place to play.

They weren't successful early Wednesday.

"I think they showed they can be resilient," Stars coach Marc Crawford said. "Not every game is going to be a masterpiece. Not every game is going to be executed to the nth degree, and tonight certainly fell into that category."

The Maple Leafs (1-7-2) were coming off their first victory of the season and playing with purpose and poise. Toronto outshot Dallas, 10-2, in the first period, and Marty Turco kept the Stars in the contest with a couple of big saves.

He bent later in the game, but he improved his record against Canadian teams to 53-19-6, as the Stars put together consecutive victories for the first time this season.

Neal and Brad Richards formed a dynamic duo throughout the game. Richards finished with two goals and has six points in his last three games.

The two were out as the forwards on the final four-on-four shift, and helped keep the puck in the offensive zone for what seemed like a minute.

Richards moved the puck off the boards, and Karlis Skrastins sent it across to Stephane Robidas. He blasted a shot from the right circle, and Neal was in perfect position on the opposite side to punch in a rebound.

"[Richards] was doing some great work there, twisting and turning," Neal said.

Nikolai Kulemin scored twice for Toronto, including a mad rush to the net to swipe in a rebound of a long Jason Blake shot that put the Leafs up, 3-2.

But as the clock was winding down in regulation, Dallas put a ton of pressure on Toronto goalie Jonas Gustavsson. Jamie Benn tossed a high pass into the slot, and Mike Ribeiro somehow deflected the puck from 25 feet away and into the upper right corner, just over Gustavsson's glove, at the 17:15 mark.

"A lot of times, you don't know where it goes," Ribeiro said. "I was probably a little bit lucky it went right in that corner."

That sent the game to overtime, and there, Neal and Richards took over.

"We talked in the room that there are lessons to be learned from games like this," Crawford said. "It shows me that even though they didn't have their best stuff, they had enough to find a push."

Copyright 2009 THE DALLAS MORNING NEWS
	Terms & Conditions     Privacy Copyright © 2009 LexisNexis, a division of Reed Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.