Morrow, Lehtonen lead Stars past Oilers
{{#rendered}} {{/rendered}}Brenden Morrow scored twice, Kari Lehtonen stopped 34 shots to bounce back from a poor performance in his previous start and the Dallas Stars beat the Edmonton Oilers 3-1 on Wednesday night in the final game before the All-Star break for both teams.
Adam Burish added a goal and Jamie Langenbrunner had the primary assist on both of Morrow's goals as the Pacific Division-leading Stars got back on track after dropping consecutive road games to Calgary and Vancouver by a combined 14-5. Lehtonen allowed all the goals in a 7-1 loss to the Canucks on Monday night.
Dustin Penner had a power-play goal for Edmonton, 4-14-3 in its last 21 games.
{{#rendered}} {{/rendered}}Nikolai Khabibulin made 18 saves for the Oilers in the second leg of a back-to-back. Edmonton won in Phoenix on Tuesday night, 4-3 on Penner's goal with 22 seconds left.
Edmonton held an 11-5 shots edge, but the Stars got the only goal of the first period at 10:38 when Burish's wrister from the right circle eluded Khabibulin.
Dallas moved to a 2-0 lead on its first power play of the night when Morrow notched his 20th of the season on a rebound at 2:32 of the second period.
{{#rendered}} {{/rendered}}Morrow converted Langenbrunner's centering pass at 8:23 of the second to make it 3-0.
Penner got the Oilers on the board at 17:44 of the second with a power-play goal, his 17th of the season.
Dallas won at Edmonton 4-2 last Thursday, and ill feelings carried over with four fights in Wednesday night's physical rematch.
{{#rendered}} {{/rendered}}Krys Barch of the Stars landed most of the punches in a second-period scrap with Zack Stortini, who spent most of the fight shielding his head with both arms. Barch ridiculed Stortini as he skated to the penalty box, mimicking Stortini's cover-up tatics. Barch received a 10-minute misconduct, and so did Dallas' James Neal as part of a fight with Theo Peckham later in the period.
Stars centers Jamie Benn and Tom Wandell missed the game with upper-body injuries sustained on Monday night in Vancouver.
Centers Aaron Gagnon and Travis Morin were called up from the AHL Texas Stars and both were in the lineup against the Oilers, with Morin making his NHL debut.
{{#rendered}} {{/rendered}}NOTES: Edmonton is 0-7-1 in its eight visits to Dallas. ... Stars D Jeff Woywitka sat out his third straight game with a shoulder injury. ... The Oilers were trapped in their end for several minutes midway through the second period. When Edmonton iced the puck three straight times, coach Tom Renney used his time out to settle his young team. ... Edmonton's penalty killers withstood a full two minutes of Dallas' 5 on 3 midway through the final period.