GLENDALE, Ariz._The Dallas Stars saw their two-game struggles continue through the first period Thursday night but awoke and took a needed 4-1 win over the Arizona Coyotes at Gila River Arena.
Dallas got a goal and assist from Devin Shore and a yeoman performance from Kari Lehtonen in goal to stop a two-game losing streak and move to 29-19-4 (62 points). The victory was needed against a Coyotes team with the worst record in the league (12-30-9, 33 points) and came despite a rocky first period in which the Stars were down 1-0 against a team that hadn't played in a week.
"We've got a rested team, this is their first game, and hopefully they're a little stale early and we can jump on them," Stars coach Ken Hitchcock said before the game. "Our focus is to have a really good start and then take care from there."
The Stars obviously didn't, but surged to score three goals in the second period. Shore batted a puck out of midair to tie the score three minutes into the second period and then made a quick decision on the second goal as he took a hard rebound off the post and fed Tyler Seguin for his 24th goal of the season.
Dallas then had an odd play in which Jamie Benn scored on the power play, but replays showed he was offside entering the offensive zone on his own pass. That goal was disallowed, but Mattias Janmark scored to give Dallas the insurance it needed. Esa Lindell added a late goal.
The Stars outshot the Coyotes 17-4 in the second period and showed the form that had them humming through most of January. Hitchcock said they would need to do that before they could start winning again.
"I can tell you, right now, you don't come out of it instantly, you crawl your way out of it," Hitchcock said before the game. "What we've got to do is first start playing better before we can expect to win. That's the first step, let's get playing better so we can evaluate ourselves properly."
