Stars play best game

The Dallas Stars weren’t spectacular, just effective.

Alex Auld made 31 saves, and Mike Ribeiro, Matt Niskanen and Loui Eriksson scored in Dallas’ 3-1 victory over the Detroit Red Wings on Wednesday night.

Brad Richards and James Neal each had two assists for the Stars.

“We played our best game, from start to finish,” Auld said.

The Stars scored two power-play goals and killed off all four Red Wings power plays.

“We were good where we had to be on the power play and killing penalties,” Dallas Coach Marc Crawford said.

Henrik Zetterberg scored for Detroit, and Jimmy Howard stopped 29 shots. The loss ended the Red Wings’ winning streak at three.

Niskanen gave the Stars a 2-0 lead 3:52 into the second period with his first goal of the season. He beat Howard with a one-timer from the point.

Zetterberg put Detroit on the board 6:16 into the middle period, then Eriksson’s power-play goal with 7:17 left gave the Stars a 3-1 lead.