Heika’s Take: Stars shine bright on Broadway, obliterate Predators on mom’s trip

All hail the moms and mentors.

In the midst of a trip with a group of loved ones, the Stars put together one of their best performances of the season in a 9-2 win over the Nashville Predators.

Dallas celebrated on Wednesday night with their moms and mentors and then came out and crushed the Preds in the first period on Thursday, outshooting them 18-1 and outscoring them 4-0.

The Predators had a minor pushback in the second, but the Stars built too much of a lead and cruised home to push their record to 7-1-0 in their past eight games and 34-14-6 overall, good for 74 points. The Stars boost their first place lead in the Central Division and continue to flirt with the top spot in the NHL.

“It just showed how important a game it was for us,” said Ty Dellandrea, who had a goal and two assists. ”It was pretty special to have our moms here to watch us and to spend this moment with them. You had the feeling in the room that everyone was here to play and here to win.”

The game was great for a lot of reasons. Yes, playing well for the moms was a special treat. But Dallas also was able to get a two-goal night out of Matt Duchene, who was bought out by the Predators this past summer and signed with Dallas. Getting a bit of revenge for Duchene had to feel good.

“It obviously feels good, but you try not to think about that stuff,” Duchene said. “You try to think more about the team and where we’re going and what we want to achieve. We’ve got to keep putting space between us and the teams below us. You’ve got to get the points when they are there.”

The Stars have games on tap against the Oilers, Bruins and Rangers, so they needed to be good, and head coach Pete DeBoer said he felt the team was ready to face a desperate Nashville team.

“I loved our start, that was probably the best start we’ve had all year,” DeBoer said. “We were on our toes, executing. I thought we were rested, we had good legs and we looked good.”

Craig Smith and Ryan Suter also are former Nashville players. Smith scored his seventh goal of the season (and fourth career goal against Nashville) and Suter had two assists. In addition, Jake Oettinger set a new career-best with his seventh consecutive win before allowing Scott Wedgewood to finish up in the third period. Dellandrea also tallied a goal and two assists, and 12 players were plus-2 or better.

“We were ready,” Suter said. “We wanted to make sure we played well for them and we came out strong.”

The loss was tough for Nashville, as they are battling to be one of the wild card teams in the Western Conference. DeBoer said before the game that everyone expected a fast start from the Predators. Instead, Dallas was off to a 1-0 lead on an unassisted goal by Sam Steel and had a 13-0 edge in shots on goal before Nashville got its first on goal with about six minutes left in the first period.

Nashville somewhat closed the gap to 6-2 midway through the second period, but the Stars ran away in the third. Nashville falls to 27-25-2 and is on the outside looking in on the playoff race at this time.

The only bad part of the win was Nils Lundkvist leaving in the first period with an upper-body injury after a hit along the boards. With Evgenii Dadonov out 4-6 weeks with a lower-body injury, that would put the Stars down to 12 forwards and six defensemen if Lundkvist is out for any extended period of time. The Stars have a roster spot to call up a player, but will likely wait to see how Saturday’s game goes against Edmonton before making a decision on the roster for a four-game road trip next week.

“It sucks losing someone, but everyone stepped up,” Suter said. “You’re playing more, you’re playing with everyone, so you have to have your mind right.”

The Stars did from the second they stepped on the ice.

It just had to have something to do with the moms.

“I think they brought a lot of energy to our group,” DeBoer said. “I think you always get a good effort out of your group when you have a parents night, moms or dads. It was a lot of fun.”

This story was not subject to the approval of the National Hockey League or Dallas Stars Hockey Club.

Mike Heika is a Senior Staff Writer for DallasStars.com and has covered the Stars since 1994. Follow him on Twitter @MikeHeika.