Stars Stay Alive With OT Win
In just a little over two minutes, the Dallas Stars found new life in the NHL playoffs.
Jamie Langenbrunner's 70-foot slap shot from beyond the blue line gave Dallas a 3-2 overtime victory over the defending Stanley Cup champion Detroit Red Wings Wednesday night and kept the Stars alive in their Western Conference playoff series.
Game 6 of the series will be played in Detroit on Friday night with the Red Wings leading the best-of-7 series 3-2.
Langenbrunner's rocket shot came just 46 seconds into the overtime. The puck took a little hop on the soft ice and beat Chris Osgood on his stick side. It was Langenbrunner's first goal of the postseason.
"I was definitely surprised it went in," Langenbrunner said. "I was just trying to get a shot on net. I just crossed the red line and shot. It hit off the heel of Osgood's stick."
Langenbrunner said the Stars knew Osgood had given up some long distance goals in earlier playoff games.
"You watch the other series and see what goes in," Langenbrunner said. "Our style against any goalie is to get the puck to the net. I don't know if I've ever had one from that far. It's been a tough playoff for me until tonight. I've been robbed several times."
Osgood had allowed a goal to tie the game just when it seemed like Detroit would clinch the series.
"The puck curled up my stick and when it got past I knew it was in. There wasn't much I could do," Osgood said as he hurried to the team bus.
Detroit coach Scotty Bowman refused to blame his goalie for the soft goal.
"We lose as a team," Bowman said. "We won two at home, so we know we can win there. We just have to start the game with an open mind. We can't think about what happened. We were trying to protect the lead and we made some mistakes."
Guy Carbonneau's wrist shot into the upper left-hand corner of the net beat Osgood on his glove side to tie the game 2-2 with 1:25 left. Carbonneau was knocked to the ice and got up just in time to receive a perfect pass from Sergei Zubov.
"I was trying to create a chance. You're desperate in that situation," Carbonneau said. "I was just trying to shoot it at the net. Nobody wanted the season to be over."
Dallas coach Ken Hitchcock said the Stars finally caught a break.
"This is three in a row where we felt we played well as a team," he said. "We caught a break with the overtime goal, but we battled hard and that's the way we have to play. Our persistence paid off. Now we get to fight another day." P>Igor Larionov's goal at 16:20 in the second period appeared to be the game-winner until the 38-year-old Carbonneau, playing in his 190th playoff game, caused the sellout crowd of 16,928 fans to go wild over his critical shot.
Larionov scored when he scrambled to his skates after being knocked down by Craig Muni. He took a pass from Niklas Lidstrom and ripped a 30-foot slap shot from the top of the left circle by goalie Ed Belfour, who looked at his glove in disbelief as the puck ripped into the net.
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