Zuccarello scores, then injured in Stars debut in win against Blackhawks

CHICAGO -- Mats Zuccarello had a goal and an assist in his debut with the Dallas Stars, but sustained an upper-body injury in a 4-3 win against the Chicago Blackhawks at United Center on Sunday.

Zuccarello is expected to miss at least four weeks. He left the game in the second period after blocking a shot from Connor Murphy.
"Yeah, blocked a shot and it hit me the wrong way, so it's unfortunate," said Zuccarello, who was traded by the New York Rangers to Dallas on Saturday for a conditional second-round pick in the 2019 NHL Draft and a conditional third-round pick in 2020. "It stinks]."
***[WATCH: [All Stars vs. Blackhawks highlights\]*
Zuccarello made it 3-0 at 1:44 of the second period from the right circle. He also had an assist on Radek Fasek's goal in the first.
"Unfortunately it was only two periods, but his playmaking, his vision, you saw it from the first shift on and it was fun to play with him," Stars forward Tyler Seguin said.

Blackhawks forward Patrick Kane's point streak ended at 20 games. He had 43 points (17 goals, 26 assists) in the longest point streak in the NHL this season.
"He had a good run," Chicago coach Jeremy Colliton said. "He's been very important for us. He finds a way to produce every night. If you look at the game, watched the game, told me he didn't get a point, he was involved. It just didn't go in for him or for the guys he's playing with, but I'm sure he'll start a new one next game."
Alexander Radulov and Jason Spezza also scored, and Anton Khudobin made 44 saves for Dallas (31-26-5), which holds the first wild card into the Stanley Cup Playoffs from the Western Conference.
"Oh yeah, it's a great win," Khudobin said. "We got two new guys, we have other guys too, and everyone stepped up today. We had to recover after [Saturday] night's game (3-0 loss against the Carolina Hurricanes). Overall, we played really well.
"As a team, the emotions, there was energy there. Keep moving forward, because there are a lot of games in front of us."
Chris Kunitz, Drake Caggiula and Jonathan Toews scored, and Cam Ward made 25 saves for Chicago (26-28-9), which remains four behind the Colorado Avalanche for the second wild card from the West.

"It can swing either way pretty quickly," Toews said. "Unfortunately we couldn't find a way to get the four points that we needed (the Blackhawks also lost 5-3 against the Colorado Avalanche on Friday), but every team is playing hard and every team is going to have a couple games here and there where they're falling back or jumping ahead, so we've just got to stay with it and focus on the next available two points. Can't worry about much else."
Faksa gave the Stars a 1-0 lead at 11:35 of the first period on a breakaway after a pass from Zuccarello.
Radulov made it 2-0 at 17:28 of the first on a backhand shot.
Kunitz cut the Stars lead to 3-1 at 2:58 of the second period from the high slot.
Caggiula made it 3-2 at 15:37 after a video review determined his shot from the right of the crease crossed the goal line.
Toews' power-play goal tied it 3-3 at 4:16 of the third period.
Spezza gave the Stars a 4-3 lead at 8:55 of the third on a power play.
"There's a lot of things that we had to overcome," Dallas coach Jim Montgomery said. "For us on a back-to-back, to get our first back-to-back win, pretty impressive by our group to dig down like they did. It just shows the fight they have inside themselves."

They said it

"Radek Faksa was incredible. I can't say enough about everybody. The team effort was unreal tonight. And we responded from [Saturday]. [Saturday] we were listless; today we played with a tremendous amount of pride." -- Stars coach Jim Montgomery
"I mean at the end of the day, I think we worked hard, but we didn't get the job done so it stings. It was obviously two big division games, but nothing we can do it about it now and just try to get two points here in Anaheim." -- Blackhawks defenseman Duncan Keith

Need to know

Stars captain Jamie Benn sustained an upper-body injury in the first period and did not return. He is day-to-day. … Defenseman Ben Lovejoy was plus-1 in 18:03 in his Dallas debut. He was acquired from the New Jersey Devils on Saturday. … Seguin has 13 points (eight goals, five assists) in his past 11 games. … Blackhawks defenseman Brent Seabrook played after missing three games because of an abdominal strain. He had six shots on goal, three hits and two blocked shots in 19:46. … Toews has eight points (four goals, four assists) in a six-game point streak. … Blackhawks defenseman Erik Gustafsson has 15 points (four goals, 11 assists) in his past 12 games.

What's next

Stars: At the Vegas Golden Knights on Tuesday (10 p.m. ET; SN, ATTSN-RM, FS-SW, NHL.TV)
Blackhawks: At the Anaheim Ducks on Wednesday (10 p.m. ET; NBCSN, NBCSCH+)