Blackhawks Tip Stars In OT

The Chicago Blackhawks won one for associate coach Lorne Molleken in dramatic fashion Friday night.

Doug Gilmour's power-play deflection with 3:49 left in overtime lifted Chicago to a 4-3 victory over the Dallas Stars as the Blackhawks had to rally four times from one-goal deficits.

Molleken, who started the season as head coach and has been running the team despite being demoted by senior vice president Bob Pulford last Dec. 2, rejoined the Hawks after attending his father's funeral in Saskatchewan on Thursday.

"We've gone through some emotional times with what's gone on here," said Gilmour. "Lorne deserves to get another shot."

Boris Mironov's shot from the left point changed direction off Gilmour's stick and beat goaltender Ed Belfour for Gilmour's 22nd goal.

"All I can say is I'm just glad he (Mironov) kept it low," said Gilmour.

Mironov took a cross-ice pass from Alexei Zhamnov to set up the game-winner.

"Alex gave me a great pass and I was able to one-time it," Mironov said. "When you've got guys like Gilmour and Tony Amonte out there, you're going to get good opportunities on the power play."

The Blackhawks were on the power play because Stars captain and top defenseman Derian Hatcher was called for cross-checking with nine seconds left in regulation.

"It's bad when you take a poor penalty at te end of the game," said Stars coach Ken Hitchcock.

Steve Sullivan tied it with 11:47 left in regulation with his 11th goal on a power play.

Mike Modano had given the Stars a 3-2 edge on a second-period power play on a one-timer from the right circle at 7:45. Dallas capitalized for three power-play goals after scoring on one of its previous 29 chances with the man advantage.

Darryl Sydor and Brett Hull also scored on the power play for the Stars, who scored on four of their previous 41 opportunities in February and started the night 24th in power-play conversion average at 14.1 percent.

"We got sucked into a game that was just specialty teams and it hurt us," Hitchcock said. "I thought we let up on them and had too many players on the light end of the game."

Zhamnov had a first-period goal and Mironov added a short-handed goal in the second period for the Blackhawks.

Dallas took a 1-0 lead at 8:40 of the first period when Sydor's slap shot from the point glanced off the stick of Chicago defenseman Anders Eriksson and past goaltender Jocelyn Thibault for Sydor's eight goal.

Chicago tied it at 18:45 of the period on Zhamnov's 15th goal.

Dallas went back in front in the second period on Hull's 19th goal, but Chicago drew even on Mironov's fourth while the Blackhawks were killing a penalty.

Then Modano put the Stars in front while Dallas was on its fourth power play of the game.

The Stars were without Joe Nieuwendyk, Jere Lehtinen, Brian Skrudland, Guy Carbonneau and Shawn Chambers, all sidelined by injuries.

Right wing Blake Sloan was placed on injured reserve before the game due to a hairline fracture of the left fibula. Right wing Jon Sim was recalled from the Stars' Michigan farm team to replace Sloan, but Sim was a healthy scratch.

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