Bishop shines as Stars blank Flames, 2-0

The Dallas Stars didn't exactly paint a Rembrandt Tuesday night against the Calgary Flames; it was more like a finger painting at times.
But goaltender Ben Bishop cleaned up the mess, stopping 38 shots for his fifth shutout of the season as they picked up a big two points with a 2-0 win at American Airlines Center.
"Ben was great, and he did an outstanding job," said Stars coach Ken Hitchcock. "Everybody is giving Ben a big hug today."

WATCH: [All Stars vs. Flames highlights]
The Stars were sloppy at times in front of Bishop Tuesday, but he was tidy in his net. Bishop was a big part of the Dallas penalty kill which was 6-6 against a hot Calgary power play, including a big kill of a 1:55 5-on-3 in the first period. Bishop stopped 12 Calgary power-play shots in the game and six more shorthanded bids by the Flames.
"It's great to see the way he played tonight because you know we're not going to play perfect hockey every night and we're going to need him to make some saves. And that's what he did for us," said Stars defenseman Dan Hamhuis. "We also don't want to rely on him like we did tonight. We have to work on our game to get better and limit some of the chances. There was a lot out there that were definitely preventable."

The Stars, who are in the first wild-card spot in the West with a 36-23-4 record, moved three points ahead of Calgary, which is in ninth place in the Western Conference standings.
"It was a really important game," said Hamhuis. "You look at the standings, and they are right there beside us. We knew what was on the line tonight. It certainly wasn't close to a perfect game, but Bish played really well for us and kept us in it."
Devin Shore and Tyler Seguin scored goals for the Stars, who played their first game after GM Jim Nill made no moves at the trade deadline and said it was up to the players who have been here all season to get the job done.
"We all believe in each other, and like Jim [Nill] said: it's about us going out there and doing it," Bishop said. "He put the onus on us, and it's one game, and we have to keep building."
The Flames (32-23-9) lost for the fourth time in the last six games. Calgary's power play, which had scored nine goals in the previous six games, went 0-6 Tuesday and misfired on a lengthy 5-on-3 in the first period.

"It's pretty simple. We had to get something on the power play, especially that 5-on-3," said Flames coach Glen Gulutzan. "I thought Bishop was really good tonight, and we had a lot of chances, but we just couldn't get anything by him. And good as he was though, we needed to get something on the 5-on-3 to get us going."
Bishop and the Stars penalty kill came up big in the first. Bishop had nice stops on Sean Monahan on a partial breakaway and a T.J. Brodie bid from the slot. Calgary had the 1:55 of 5-on-3 power-play time, but it couldn't take advantage. Dougie Hamilton came close, hitting the crossbar.
"It was a big kill," said Bishop. "The guys did a good job in front of me. We have been working on it and talking about it and trying to get better."
The Stars came close on their only full power play of the period when John Klingberg hit the crossbar.
Dallas finally broke through in the final minute with a goal on the rush. After making a nice play to clear the defensive zone, Shore joined the rush, took a pass from Remi Elie, skated from the slot to the left circle and beat Flames goalie Jon Gillies with a wrist shot to put Dallas up 1-0 with 38.5 seconds left in the period.

"It was a nice pass by [Elie]," Shore said. "I was going to shoot, did a quick fake, and then it went in."
The Stars pushed the lead to 2-0 midway through the second with a power-play goal when Jamie Benn set up Seguin, who scored from the right circle at the 10:04 mark.
Bishop made 17 saves in the period, including one on Monahan on the power play as the Stars killed off two more Calgary chances with the man-advantage and then the Dallas netminder turned away a point-blank shorthanded chance by T.J. Brodie and made back-to-back saves on Matt Stajan on a shorthanded 2-on-1.
Bishop made 13 more saves in the third, including a nice stop on Hamilton and then a sharp save on Stajan with Calgary on the power play with 9.1 seconds left to preserve the shutout and nail down a big win for the Stars.
"[Bishop] held us together and it's two points, and we've got to move ahead quickly," said Hitchcock. "We've got 24 hours to get ready for [Tampa Bay], one of the best teams, if not the best team in the National Hockey League coming in here and we can't play like this. The players know that."

Notes

What's Next

The Stars host the Tampa Bay Lightning on Thursday at American Airlines Center. This will be the second and final meeting of the season against Tampa Bay, which owns the best record in the league. The Lightning won the first meeting, 6-1, in Tampa Bay on Nov. 16.

Stars Lineup

Mattias Janmark - Tyler Seguin - Remi Elie
Antoine Roussel - Jamie Benn - Alexander Radulov
Devin Shore - Radek Faksa - Tyler Pitlick
Gemel Smith - Jason Spezza - Brett Ritchie
Esa Lindell - John Klingberg
Dan Hamhuis - Greg Pateryn
Marc Methot - Stephen Johns
Ben Bishop
Kari Lehtonen
Scratched:Julius Honka, Jason Dickinson
Injured:Martin Hanzal (lower body)

This story was not subject to approval of the National Hockey League or Dallas Stars Hockey Club.
Mark Stepneski is an independent writer whose posts on DallasStars.com reflect his own opinions and do not represent official statements from the Dallas Stars. You can follow him on Twitter @StarsInsideEdge.