Red Wings advance to finals

Detroit pounced on Dallas for a 4-1 Game 6 victory.

DALLAS (AP) — Dominant in the regular season, superb again in the postseason, the Detroit Red Wings are headed back to the Stanley Cup finals.

With gusto, too.

Just when the Red Wings lost consecutive games and were starting to look vulnerable, they bounced back strong in Game 6 of the Western Conference finals, getting first-period goals from Kris Draper, Pavel Datsyuk and Dallas Drake on their way to knocking out the Dallas Stars 4-1 Monday night.

Now Detroit goes from worrying about becoming the third team to blow a 3-0 series lead to trying to win its fourth championship in 11 seasons. The Red Wings will face the Pittsburgh Penguins, with the first two games at Joe Louis Arena (Saturday and Memorial Day).

Dallas won Games 4 and 5 by limiting Detroit to a goal each game. The Red Wings exceeded that output in the first period Monday, with all three goals coming on uncontested shots right in front of the net. Henrik Zetterberg added a short-handed goal early in the second period and the series was all but over then.

Red Wings goalie Chris Osgood didn’t have to do much the first two periods, then got busy in the third. He passed all but one test, getting beat by Stephane Robidas during a power play.

Osgood improved to 10-2 this postseason. It was his 100th career playoff game and his 55th victory — his 48th for Detroit, passing Hall of Famer Terry Sawchuk for the franchise record.

Detroit’s walloping knockout punch shouldn’t have been a surprise. The Red Wings beat Nashville 3-0 to end the opening round, then crushed Colorado 8-2 to end the second round.

While the end was ugly, the Stars had their best postseason since 2000, when they were defending Cup champions and made it back to the conference finals. Dallas dethroned reining champion Anaheim, then ousted San Jose in the second round, finishing it off with a four-overtime thriller.

Maybe that marathon sapped them at the start of this series. And maybe their two-game rally sapped them for Game 6.

Dallas didn’t even have a shot when the Red Wings got their first goal and they wasted their first six power plays. On one of them, they had a chance for a 5-on-3 advantage until Brad Winchester got called for boarding seconds after officials signaled for a delayed penalty.