Brad Richards scores 200th career goal as Dallas Stars edge Anaheim Ducks
If there’s one thing that the 2010-11 National Hockey League season has been full of thus far, it’s milestones. When the Dallas Stars faced the Anaheim Ducks on Tuesday 16 November, centre
Brad Richards reached a milestone of his own in the Stars’ 2-1 victory.
How it happened
The home team got the game off to a good start when Steve Ott beat Jonas Hiller of the Ducks with a wrist shot at 14:43 of the opening period. The power play marker was Ott’s fourth goal
of the season, with Richards earning an assist on the play.
Anaheim replied with a power play goal of their own at 8:29 of the second frame. Corey Perry’s wrist shot got past Kari Lehtonen, and was assisted by Teemu Selanne and Lubomir Visnovsky.
In the third period, Richards appeared to have given the Stars a 2-1 lead, but the on-ice officials initially disallowed it. However, after an extensive video review, the decision was
overturned, and Richards earned the 200th goal of his NHL career. The goal turned out to be the game-winner for the Stars, and they would preserve their lead and ultimately win the game.
What they’re saying
Richards’ milestone goal was the highlight of this game, and Stars head coach Marc Crawford said that his team deserved to score the two goals that led them to victory.
“I don’t know if it was a break … I think we deserved to score the goals that we did,” Crawford told reporters after the game. “We had several great chances. It was a real good game. Our
guys, they’ve got to get prepared to play as many of these games as they possibly can. If we have that type of effort and that type of commitment to play an overall game, then we can be very successful.”
Richards added that the home-ice advantage worked well for the team, as that had not played at home for more than a week.
“It was tough at times, but we stayed with it," Richards said of the Stars’ efforts. “We hadn’t been home for a little over a week, so it was good to be back here. We needed a win.”
Ducks head coach Randy Carlyle said that his team was presented with many scoring chances throughout the game, but they failed to capitalize on them.
“We had our fair share of chances,” Carlyle said. “It wasn’t like we were devoid of chances, we came up empty. Even more so, we had lots of good chances on our power play, too. ... We’re
just not really sharp offensively. We’ve got to think ‘shoot more,’ be a little more selfish.”
Dallas’ next opponents will be the San Jose Sharks, who they’ll face on Thursday 18 November. Anaheim will travel to Minnesota to play the Minnesota Wild on Wednesday 17 November.
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