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Saturday, May 16, 1998

Stars looking to advance to conference finals on strong veteran play

By C. BRYSON HULL / Associated Press Writer

DALLAS (AP) -- The Dallas Stars face a choice between choke and chokehold.

Holding a 3-1 Western Conference series lead over the Edmonton Oilers, the Stars are expected to finish off the Oilers in Game 5 Saturday night at Reunion Arena. If they lose, they'll inevitably draw comparisons to the Colorado Avalanche, who held the same 3-1 lead but fell to the Oilers in seven games.

But if the last two games are any indication, veteran Dallas players like Guy Carbonneau, Benoit Hogue and Mike Keane will help push the Stars into the conference finals.

"Those guys always seem to know another gear to play at," Stars coach Ken Hitchcock said of his veteran core. "Where they're valuable to is when they pull the younger players along."

Certainly, the elder players have carried the entire team to their current series lead. Center Benoit Hogue, 31, was twice the hero with the overtime-winning goal in Monday's Game 3 and two goals in Wednesday's Game 4 victory.

Thirty-eight-year-old center Guy Carbonneau opened the scoring in Game 4, while Keane had a goal in Game 1 against Edmonton and two goals -- including the overtime winner -- to close out the first-round series against the San Jose Sharks on May 3.

But the Stars contend that it is work ethic, not veteran knowledge that has kept them winning.

"I learned a long time ago that experience doesn't win you games, you have to work harder," Carbonneau said.

What also wins games is Dallas' disciplined, strangling defense. Ask Edmonton coach Ron Low.

"(The Stars) came at us an awful lot harder than they did before," Low said. "You couldn't get through the neutral zone (Wednesday night)."

On the other side of the ice, the Stars are expecting that type of desperate, hard-checking effort from the Oilers.

"I think you'll see a lot of what you saw in Game 2, but hopefully not from us," Stars center Mike Modano said, referring to Dallas' 2-0 loss in Game 2, during which they were only able to manage 15 shots.

The Oilers were at the brink just a series ago, down 3-1 before beating the Colorado Avalanche three straight times to advance to the semifinals.

The series win made them only the 14th team in NHL history to come back from a 3-1 deficit, but no team has ever done it in back-to-back series. That doesn't have the Oilers worried, though.

"Last series, we felt we played with Colorado in the first four games," Oilers center Doug Weight said. "In this series, we feel we deserve a better fate for our effort in the first four games."

A victory against the Stars in Reunion Arena would swing the series back in favor of the Oilers mentally, if not numerically, goaltender Curtis Joseph said.

"If we win this game, it's a new series again with the momentum shifting back to us," Joseph said.

A major factor in the Stars' first-round collapse last season, Joseph has again played goal in dramatic, virtually seamless fashion.

Unfortunately for the Oilers, so has Stars goalie Ed Belfour, who is playing the asphyxiating style that he showed when he led the Chicago Blackhawks to the Stanley Cup finals in 1992.

"They've both been unbelievable," Low said. "Billy Guerin has had some excellent chances and Belfour has stopped him."

But the Stars' defense, all the way back to Belfour, has done little to foil the devil-may-care attitude that Edmonton has exhibited this playoff season.

"That's basically the way it was in Colorado: 'Hey, we're on the edge -- let's see what happens,' " Low said.