Punch-drunk defeat
DALLAS — Sidney Crosby rarely uses his fists, and the Pittsburgh Penguins seldom lose to the Dallas Stars.
Loui Eriksson scored twice — including a penalty-shot goal — Kari Lehtonen made 21 saves, and the Stars earned a fight-filled 5-2 victory over the Penguins Wednesday night.
Crosby, who entered the night with only four penalty minutes this season, squared off against Matt Niskanen at 12:33 of the second period while Pittsburgh trailed by three goals.
That was one of four bouts in the first two periods.
Dallas' Jamie Benn exchanged punches with Tyler Kennedy in the first period and with Chris Kunitz in the second.
Two seconds after Stars captain Brenden Morrow and Kris Letang of the Penguins joined the undercard in the second period, Crosby invited Niskanen to drop the gloves.
"Morrow went after Letang there, so it was just a response, sticking up for Tanger," Crosby said. "I don't think you really need to fight him there, but that's all it was."
Niskanen was at first stunned that Crosby challenged him. Niskanen quickly gathered himself and held his own against the Penguins captain.
"I never saw that coming," Niskanen said. "We were up 4-1, he was trying to get the team going a little bit, he asked me to go, and we went. I got him hard once in the helmet, if that counts. But he's very strong on his skates and he probably had the upper hand a little bit."
Dallas had been 0-4-1 in the previous five matchups with Pittsburgh. The Stars beat the Penguins for the first time since March 2, 2003.
But the Crosby-Niskanen fight was the talk of both locker rooms.
"You've got to give credit to Sidney trying to inspire his group," Stars coach Marc Crawford said. "I like the way Matt Niskanen got in there, he certainly will be on a lot of highlight tapes tonight."
Stephane Robidas and Brad Richards each had a goal and an assist for Dallas. Steve Ott added a goal, and James Neal had two assists for the Stars.
Kennedy and Matt Cooke scored for the Penguins, who opened a stretch of three games in four nights against Western Conference opponents.
Brent Johnson stopped 24 shots for Pittsburgh, which has lost four of five (1-3-1). Johnson went 5-0-1 in his first six starts this season and was coming off his 14th NHL shutout in his previous outing Saturday at Carolina.
