Dallas-Anaheim: Stars Decide First 50 Minutes of the Game Not Necessary

What began as a day with talk of "Belief," quickly turned into "Disbelief."  That is, if you're a fan of the Dallas Stars.

When the Stars returned home with a 2-0 edge in their series with Anaheim, spirits were high, and talk of pulling out the brooms was the definitive chatter amongst fans.

Once the puck dropped for game 3, Stars fans were reminded of their past playoff woes.

Anaheim came out of the gate looking like the same team that had been hobbling around in the first two games.  They looked out of sync, lost, and just looked run down.  Once they scored the opening goal of the game however, the whole story changed.

Todd Marchant's first period goal, which was a beauty of a chip shot, woke the champions from their two game slumber, and Dallas was not ready for it.

Close to 4 minutes after Marchant gave Anaheim it's first lead in the series, Ryan Getzlaf was not about to see Dallas mount any momentum to try and recover, as he intercepted an errant pass from Niklas Hagman, went one on one with Marty Turco, and with a move that can only be described as beautiful, notched Anaheim's second goal of the period.

Good enough for the first?  "OH NO" says Ducks Captain, Chris Pronger, who notched the Ducks first Power Play goal of the game, and third of the period.

In a nutshell, the roles of games one and two were reversed for game three.

The second period, the Stars showed a few more signs of life, at least mounting some pressure against the Ducks defense and J.S. Giguere.

But the Stars would remain empty handed, while Pronger decided 1 power play goal for himself, and 3 goals as a team wasn't enough.  Roughly 6 minutes into the second Pronger, again, blasts a shot by Marty Turco, and silencing the Dallas crowd.

So what is there left to do?  Oh yeah, play the third period.  Coach Tippett's words of wisdom must have been something to hear in that intermission.

The Stars came out looking like they were simply trying to save face.  You know the feeling, get a goal so you're not blanked at home.  That's basically what it resembled... At first.

Roughly 6 minutes into the period, Ryan Getzlaf takes a penalty for tripping down in the Ducks end.

After a faceoff win by Mike Ribeiro, and the passing of the Stars Power Play unit that the fans are used to seeing, Brenden Morrow wrestles away from his "living blanket," Chris Pronger, and receives a beautiful pass from Ribeiro, which he simply gift-wraps into the open net.

So the Stars have saved face, right?  Well, yeah, but when about 2 minutes tick by and it's Brad May who goes to the sin bin, the Stars seem to adopt Texas Gubonatorial Candidate, Kinky Friedman's, approach of "Why the hell not?"

After one stymie at passing through the Ducks passive box, the Stars decide to reinact their last power play attempt, and once again, Brenden Morrow receives the pass from Modano and Ribeiro, and all of a sudden it's a 4-2 game.

As the clock hit 00:00, the Stars lost game three, but the momentum might just have returned to their side with how the game ended.

The Ducks looked rugged in the third, which was a dramatic change from the first two periods.  The Stars, however, looked like they had found their feet, and with game four also in Dallas, if the Stars play like they did in the third, Anaheim is in for a ride.

Also the worry of the "sweep" is off of their back, which could lighten the load as they progress in this series.

I still stand by my claim... Stars in 6!