by Mark Stepneski of Andrew's Stars Page

Dallas heads into the All Star break on a lethargic note.

DALLAS — The Dallas Stars were hoping to head into the All-Star break on a positive, but the struggling Buffalo Sabres had other ideas. The Sabres snapped an eight-game road winless streak and won for just the second time in 14 games, beating the Stars 2-1 at the American Airlines Center Thursday night.

The Stars head into the break with back-to-back losses and finished their pre-break homestand with a 2-2-0 record. Their power play, which was 0-6 in Tuesday's 4-2 loss to Columbus, was 0-6 on Thursday. It is now 1-27 over the last six games.

"When you go into the third period and you get a couple of power plays and you don't get a quality scoring chance on goal, something is wrong," said Stars coach Dave Tippett. "You are relying on people to create stuff, and we are just not getting it done right now."

Stu Barnes scored the lone goal for the Stars. Marty Turco got the start in goal and stopped 17 of 19 shots.

"We knew it was going they were going to be a desperate team coming and we just couldn't generate the chances we needed," said Barnes.

The Sabres ended road misery on a couple fronts with their win. They not only snapped an 0-5-3 road slide, but also won in Dallas for the first time since 1999. And they also will head into the break with a .500 record (21-21-6).

"I thought we played well in all areas tonight," Buffalo head coach Lindy Ruff said.

Buffalo struck 1:51 into the game when Derek Roy was left alone in front of the Dallas net and redirected a Drew Stafford pass by Turco to give the Sabres a 1-0 lead.

"We needed a spark and got it early," said Roy, who scored both Buffalo goals. "It was a quick goal and it put them back on their heels."

The Sabres came close to making it a 2-0 game on the next shift, but a sprawling Turco stopped a point blank shot by a wide open Jochen Hecht.

The Stars had a couple of good chances in the period, but Sabres goalie Ryan Miller, who made 25 saves in the game, made nice stops on Loui Eriksson backhand chance and denied a shorthanded bid by Niklas Hagman.

The Sabres had a couple of good chances to extend their lead in the second period, but Daniel Paille missed the open side of the net from point blank range and Brian Campbell fired high on a good chance from close range.

The Stars got the equalizer at 17:08 of the second when Mattias Norstrom sent a pass from the left circle to the front of the net, where Barnes tapped it past Miller.

The Sabres misfired on another prime chance late in the period when Thomas Vanek whiffed on a point blank chance with Turco down in the crease and Buffalo on the power play. Vanek also appeared to score on an earlier power play chance, but he deflected the puck in with a high stick and that one was waved off.

But Vanek and Roy teamed up on a pretty give-and-go on a two-on-one break at 5:12 of the third period that provide the game's winning goal. After Norstrom got caught up ice, the Sabres duo came into the Dallas zone on defenseman Matt Niskanen and Roy finished off a nice saucer pass from Vanek.

The Stars put some pressure on late. Brenden Morrow made a nice backhand pass to Mike Ribeiro in front of the net with just seconds left in the game, but Hecht knocked the puck away from Ribeiro to deny a shot on goal.

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