In Dallas, the Stars won their fourth straight game, 5-2, over the Detroit Red Wings on Tuesday night.
Jake Oettinger made 24 saves to get the win.
“We all love to play meaningful hockey, and right now every game means a lot,” Dallas’ Jason Dickinson said. “I expect us to keep rising and keep pushing, and when we lose one guy, someone is going to have to step right in.”
Dallas improved to 19-14-14.
“It wasn’t that long ago that we were 12 points back, and now we are within one,” Stars head coach Rick Bowness said. “The schedule isn’t going to get any easier — we have nine road games coming up (out of their final 11 games) — but we’re in the hunt.”
Dallas took a 3-0 lead on goals from Tanner Kero, Jason Robertson and Joe Pavelski; all three goals came in the first period.
“We were just terrible defensively in the first period,” Red Wings head coach Jeff Blashill said. “We’ve been a pretty good defensive team this season, but tonight we gave them easy, easy goals.”
Dallas pushed the lead to 4-0 when Jamie Oleksiak scored early in the middle frame.
“We were putting up some good offensive-zone time, but we kept shooting ourselves in the foot at the other end,” Gagner said. “We have been pretty good lately at keeping teams to the outside, but we let them get inside tonight.”
Detroit’s Valtteri Filppula and Dylan Larkin closed the gap to 4-2.
Blake Comeau iced the game with an empty-net goal.
Jonathan Bernier got the start for Detroit, he yielded all four Dallas goals and made eight saves.
“[Bernier] has been fantastic for us this year, and he’s fought through an injury to get back here,” the Red Wings’ Sam Gagner said. “We have to do a better job of giving him a chance. Those goals were all going to be tough to stop.”
Thomas Greiss entered the game early in the middle frame and made 11 saves in relief.
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