DENVER – Marty Turco stopped 29 shots in regulation and overtime and made two more saves in a shootout, helping the Dallas Stars end the Colorado Avalanche’s four-game winning streak with a 3-2 victory.

Sergei Zubov beat Avalanche goalie Peter Budaj to the glove side to open the first shootout in Dallas history, then Turco stopped Milan Hejduk, spinning around to block the shot with his back. Jussi Jokinen beat Budaj stick side at the other end, and Turco secured Dallas’ third win in eight games by nearly doing the splits to stop Alex Tanguay with his skate.

The game was fast and furious at the start before slowing to a grind by the third period.

The Avalanche spent most of the second period chipping pucks out of their zone and mustered four shots in the third, leading to shouts of “Go!” and “Shoot!” from the fans.

Dallas had all kinds of scoring chances in the second period, tying it on Antti Miettinen’s power-play goal with two minutes left, but had trouble with Colorado’s defense in the final period, getting six shots. Dallas’ Philippe Boucher nearly won it with five minutes left in regulation, when his shot from the right circle climbed Budaj’s stick and landed on top of the goal, and Stu Barnes hit the post with 11/2 minutes left in overtime.

Colorado had scored at least four goals in seven straight games and had 53 goals in the first 12 games. Dallas struggled a bit early, but was coming off its highest scoring game in nine years, getting nine goals against Chicago on Friday night.

No surprise then that the first period included 23 shots and three goals.

Colorado’s Andrew Brunette started it off six minutes in, gathering Pierre Turgeon’s pass just outside the crease before spinning around and flipping it in.

Mike Modano tied it less than two minutes later, punching in a rebound for his sixth of the season after Budaj stopped Barnes’ redirected shot.

Steve Konowalchuk put the Avalanche back up with eight minutes left in the first, getting a short-handed goal on a breakaway after Dallas forward Brenden Morrow mishandled a puck at the Stars’ blue line.

The Stars picked up the pressure even more in the second period, thanks in part to Colorado’s five penalties.

Budaj did his best to keep Dallas out of the net, turning away a flurry of shots on the third power play, but the Stars just had too many chances. Miettinen scored on Dallas’ 13th of 16 shots in the period, raking in rebound on a power play with two minutes left.

Notes: A fight between Colorado’s Ian Laperriere and Steve Ott broke out early in the second period. Laperriere clearly got the better end of it, landing about a dozen punches to the top of Ott’s head. … Tanguay had his 10-game points streak end.

AP-ES-11-05-05 2349EST


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