Blackhawks end Stars winning streak at 8

CHICAGO -- The Dallas Stars had their franchise-record winning streak end at eight games when they lost 3-2 to the Chicago Blackhawks at United Center on Saturday.

“It’s always disappointing to lose the game,” Stars defenseman Miro Heiskanen said. “Of course, we’re going to lose at some point but we had our chances to win it. Couldn’t do it tonight. Hopefully we can get the win tomorrow (at the Colorado Avalanche).”

Connor Bedard, Andreas Athanasiou and Seth Jones scored in the second period for the Blackhawks (23-48-5), who led 3-0. Petr Mrazek made 42 saves.

“Petr stood on his head, as he has all season,” Jones said. “We played a lot of defensive zone. Lot of stuff around our net happening, but we found a way to block some shots and just kind of get the puck out of our zone in the neutral zone and withstand that barrage of pressure.”

Roope Hintz and Jamie Benn scored, Heiskanen had two assists, and Scott Wedgewood made 14 saves for the Stars (48-20-9), who remained three points ahead of the Avalanche for first place in the Central Division.

Bedard gave the Blackhawks a 1-0 lead with a power-play goal at 4:48. He picked up the puck at the right point, skated into the right face-off circle and put a wrist shot past Wedgewood with Nick Foligno providing a screen in front. That ended a stretch of 1:77:08 in which the Stars hadn’t allowed a goal. They were coming off back-to-back shutouts, against the Edmonton Oilers on Wednesday (5-0) and the Seattle Kraken on Saturday (3-0).

Bedard had gone seven games without a goal, last scoring March 17 in a 5-2 win against the San Jose Sharks.

“It feels like I’m on the schneid a lot,” Bedard said. “Whenever you score one, it’s nice. It’s not easy to put them in, so it definitely feels good.”

Athanasiou made it 2-0 at 5:53, scoring his first goal of the season in his 22nd game. Lukas Reichel skated into the zone and through the slot before making a drop pass to Athanasiou, who scored with a wrist shot from the left circle.

The Blackhawks pushed it to 3-0 at 8:51 when Jones took a cross-ice pass from Ryan Donato in the left circle and scored to the far side.

“Great feed,” Jones said. “Risky play. I’m sure the coaches didn’t love it. I just tried to beat a couple guys up ice and create an odd-man situation, and great sauce pass there on the tape, tried to put it on the net.”

Hintz got the Stars to within 3-1 at 15:37, scoring in the low slot with a tip of Heiskanen’s shot from the top of the left circle.

Dallas outshot Chicago 23-5 in the second.

“We're in the learning process,” Mrazek said. “I think we're learning how to close those games and how to play against teams like Dallas, [a] top two or three team in the NHL, and we have to just learn mentally and physically how to play those games and have a game plan and finish those games when we can.”

Benn cut it to 3-2 at 15:37 of the third period with his 20th goal of the season, tipping a Heiskanen shot. The goal was upheld upon video review by the NHL Situation Room.

“When you’re on an eight-game winning streak, you hope that puck luck can continue a little bit,” Stars coach Pete DeBoer. “We had some during the streak and tonight we didn’t have enough of it. Credit to them, they played hard, they blocked 25, 30 shots (27). Mrazek was good. You go into any building if the opponent’s goalie is First Star and their team is blocking 20-30 shots, you’re going to be in for a tight game. So credit to them.”

NOTES: Stars forward Mavrik Bourque made his NHL debut after being called up from Texas of the American Hockey League on Friday. The 22-year-old had two shots on goal and was 2-for-6 on face-offs in 10:19 of ice time. “It felt good,” Bourque said. “Been waiting for that for a while and to get the first one was pretty awesome. Unfortunately you always want to win in your first game, but that’s part of it.” He was leading the AHL with 72 points (26 goals, 46 assists) in 66 games. … Bourque replaced Tyler Seguin, who is managing an upper-body injury that caused him to miss 11 games from Feb. 24-March 16. Seguin is expected to play Sunday. … Bedard scored his seventh game-opening goal in the NHL, passing Denis Savard and Murray Balfour for the most by a rookie in Blackhawks history. Bedard’s 22 goals are the third-most by an 18-year-old in the past 10 years, behind Columbus Blue Jackets forward Patrik Laine (36) and Colorado Avalanche center Nathan MacKinnon (24).