Small Husky Takes a HUGE Step

When Dallas Stars captain Brenden Morrow was injured by a Chicago Blackhawk skate, forcing him to have surgery on tendons in his wrist, the Stars went to their Iowa franchise and called up Conner, who had previously played 2 games with the greater Stars this season.

A detail of the call up is found here.

The Stars headed to Denver tonight for a match against the Avalanche. Lou Erikson started the scoring for Dallas, followed by two Av goals, scored by Wojtek Wolski and Joe Sakic. With less than 2 minutes remaining in the first, Chris Conner evened the score for the Stars, with assists by Trevor Daley and Stu Barnes. The Stars would move on to win the game 5-4.

As of right now, both the Stars and Avalanche websites have not posted photos or highlights. I will pick apart the results once they are uploaded, but for now we're stuck with the knowledge that Conner was able to find the back of the net in only his third game as a NHL level pro. This goal came after another shorthander for the Iowa Stars, and three more assists since December 22. Instead of making remarks as to the height of Conner, I propose that is more of an accomplishment for him to prove himself through hard work from one of the lowest-ranked WCHA teams to one of the NHL's best. Hopefully his recent performances will be able to convince the Stars' coaching staff that he's a keeper. Stay tuned for further updates.

Edit: Here's a play-by-play recap from NHL.com.

Edit: Dallas posted their video on their main page here. Conner's goal is the first one in. For those of you who have slow computers, Conner and Barnes were behind the net, and Barnes took the puck around, firing it to Daley at the point. Daley fired a hard slapshot at Theodore, which fluttered out to his open left, and Conner tapped the rebound in.