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Saturday, May 23, 1998

Dallas hoping to chip out win

By GRANT KERR

Toronto Globe and Mail

Bad hops on chipped ice might be an advantage for the Dallas Stars when they begin their Western Conference final at home against the Detroit Red Wings.

Warmer temperatures in Texas may produce even softer ice conditions at Reunion Arena, Mike Modano said, possibly making it easier to contain such Detroit stars as the highly skilled Sergei Fedorov.

Modano likely will be matched against Fedorov in the series opener Sunday in a city-owned arena built in 1980 and infamous for poor ice conditions year-round.

Former Dallas center Dave Gagner once suffered the embarrassment of having the puck bounce over his stick while taking a penalty shot against Detroit netminder Chris Osgood four years ago.

"It's an old arena and they don't have the ability to keep it as cold as some of the other major arenas," Modano said. "I don't think it's going to change much from the regular season.

"It gets chippy and soft as the game goes on, but it's something we've got used to."

Modano figures the Stars have an advantage over Detroit because Dallas plays half its games at Reunion, where the short-passing game is a necessity because longer passes tend to hop, skip and jump all over the ice surface.

Detroit uses eight import skaters most games and the Europeans and Russians often use longer passes when trying to break away fast-skating attackers.

"The ability to make cross-ice passes after 10 or 12 minutes is tough," Modano said. "It's a game of being around the puck an awful lot, playing along the boards and in the corners.

"The puck bounces after a while and you don't know where it's going to bounce. You just lay it out in the neutral zone and there's a lot of pucks that go over sticks that end up being scoring chances. It's a big difference from Canadian arenas or even stadiums up north where it's still somewhat cooler than down here."

Modano has learned to cope with the conditions and leads the Stars in playoff scoring with 10 points, including three goals.

His defensive play last series against Edmonton's Doug Weight drew praise from many hockey insiders. Modano now plans for the three-headed monster matchup against accomplished Detroit centers Fedorov, Steve Yzerman and Igor Larionov. And when the series moves to Detroit, Modano may face checking center Kris Draper of the Wings.

"The catalysts of their team, the guys they seem to follow, are Fedorov and Yzerman," Modano said. "Those two players will be the focal point of our team and two guys we check hard.

"It's going to be quite a challenge to match up with Fedorov. He's a phenomenal player and peaking at the right time. He's had a long layoff -1/8contract holdout-3/8, but the last couple months he's gotten better and better, and back to the old Fedorov that we're all familiar with.

"It will be a good test for me and a good test for -1/8linemates-3/8 Mike Keane and Greg Adams as well. We have to play well as a line to check him."

The Stars will need offensive contributions from other lines other than his, Modano said in reference to the absence of center Joe Nieuwendyk, sidelined for the rest of the season with a knee injury. Benoit Hogue scored only six times in 53 league games, but leads the Stars with four playoff goals in 10 games.

Hogue has taken over second-line center duties that went to Nieuwendyk before his season suddenly ended when he was checked hard into the boards by San Jose defender Bryan Marchment in the opening game of the playoffs.

The Detroit matchup will be a measuring stick of sorts for the Dallas franchise. The Stars moved to Texas from Minnesota five years ago and have had three winning seasons in the five headquartered at Reunion.

"Everybody in the conference has altered their game because of Detroit, because of their speed, their ability to check and score at the same time," Modano said. "It's turned into a speed game. If you have speedy forwards who can check and score at the same time, you can have a lot of success from that."

Dallas, like Detroit, uses four lines extensively in an attempt to establish a high tempo. It's a strategy that seems to agree with Modano, who grew up in Livona, Mich., admiring a young Yzerman in the mid-1980s.

(Distributed by Scripps Howard News Service.)