All Blacks are taking another game up there this year

DALLAS -- Dan Hamhuis didnt tell his Dallas teammates it was his 34th birthday.Instead, he gave them a gift with his first goal for the Stars, opening a five-goal third period that beat the Anaheim Ducks 6-2 on Tuesday night.Hamhuis tipped in Jamie Benns cross-ice pass on the power play, tying it 2-all at 5:41.When you get to this age, (birthdays) arent that important, Hamhuis said.It was nice to get that first one out of the way. Jamie made a great play. It wasnt very hard for me to put that one in after he made that great pass. It was nice to be involved in key goal, too, to get our rally started.After that, Adam Cracknell, Patrick Eaves and Benn scored to drive Anaheim goalie John Gibson from the game at 12:24. Radek Faksa added an empty-netter at 13:57.Stephen Johns scored the first goal of the game for Dallas in the second period.Cracknells winner came 52 seconds after Hamhuis score. Cracknell and Devin Shore rushed the net, and the puck went in off the stick of Anaheims Corey Perry.If Shore doesnt drive, that doesnt go off of Perrys stick, Stars coach Lindy Ruff said. He got to the inside, he did the right thing: He stopped, got to the paint.Dallas had lost six of eight. Anaheim was 6-1-1 in its previous eight.There was a lot of good inside the game, Ruff said. I thought our penalty killing was good, especially when you treat that team to two 5-on-3s.The Ducks outshot the Stars 36-27, but Antti Niemi made 34 saves to improve to 6-1-1 at home this season. He had not played in the previous five games.Antti gave us a great game tonight, which allowed us to finish this one off, Ruff said.Anaheim coach Randy Carlyle said his team should have scored more.When we have as many opportunities, point blank and 2-on-1s on the goaltender, weve got to score more goals than we did tonight, thats for sure, he said.Cracknell said the Stars remained confident even after falling behind in the third.We had the feeling in the room that if you keep on giving them power plays, theyre going to get their chances, he said. Antti played great. He saved us in the first. We knew if we stayed within our system, we were going to get our wins.Perry and Ryan Getzlaf scored for the Ducks. Getzlaf assisted on Perrys power-play goal.Benn had a goal and two assists. His brother, Jordie, and Tyler Seguin each had two assists.Perry got his seventh of the season for a 2-1 lead 5 seconds after a two-man advantage ended in the third period.Dallas killed a 5-on-3 situation for 1:09 in the first period. Niemi made four saves during the two-man advantage, one on Getzlafs slap shot from the blue line with Ryan Kesler hovering on the doorstep.Game notes Stars D Jamie Oleksiak sat out the second game of a two-game suspension for an illegal check to the head of Philadelphias Chris VandeVelde on Sunday. ... Hamhuis goal was his first since April 1 for Vancouver, also against the Ducks and Gibson. It was a short-side goal there that squeaked in, Hamhuis recalled. ... Seguin has 21 assists this season. ... Cracknell has three of his five points in two games vs. Anaheim this season. ... Perry has eight points (three goals, five assists) in his last six games. ... Ducks C Antoine Vermette, who entered leading the NHL in faceoff winning percentage (65 percent), won 14 of 21 (67 percent) on Tuesday.UP NEXTDucks: Travel to Boston for the second game of a six-game trip on Thursday. The last five will be in the Eastern time zone.Stars: Play the second game of a five-game homestand Thursday against the Rangers. Cheap Air Max Free Shipping . Manuel was offered a position the day he was fired. He accepted earlier this week and the team made the announcement Friday. Clearance Air Max . Most important, perhaps, it went off without a hitch. Organizers poked a little fun at the now-infamous opening ceremony gaffe that saw only four out of five snowflakes open up into rings, leaving the Olympics logo one ring short. https://www.airmaxchina.us/ . For the Wild it was their first win of the season and they now have a record of 1-1-2 while the Jets fall to 2-2. Jets start a six game home stand Friday with another divisional game, home to the Dallas Stars. Cheap Air Max . Jason Zucker and Matt Cooke also scored for Minnesota, which has won five of six. Kuemper made five saves in the first, nine in the second, and nine in the third. The rookies best save came with 2:17 left in the third period when he denied former Wild forward Matt Cullen from just outside of the crease on the right side. Cheap Authentic Air Max . -- Bobby Ryan helped the U. Super Rugby must embrace an American attitude for the future - but dont expect that to include a United States franchise anytime soon.Thats the message out of SANZAAR after officials confirmed they would retain the controversial Super Rugby draw in its entirety for 2017, with just the South African conferences swapping crossover fixtures between Australia and New Zealand as originally planned.That result is likely to be met with a mixed response across the competitions stakeholders, and the fans, after the 2016 season created confusion and had its overall integrity questioned.Much of that reaction was down to the conference-based format and the awarding of home finals to the four conference winners despite three New Zealand franchises having legitimate cause for a home quarterfinal.The response to that from the competitions administrators was simple: Its time southern hemisphere rugby supporters adopted Americas attitude to conference style sport.I think one of the mindset shifts that we need to do better, all of us, is to break away from the traditional rugby format, SANZAAR Operations Manager Brendan Morris said at an Australian media briefing on Monday.Were so used to in Australia, we play each other home and away, and thats the only way you can do competition structures. Nobody ever says to the Seahawks, oh you didnt play Dallas Cowboys this year and you won the Super Bowl, so how could that be an [integrous] competition?.Americans grow up with conference-style sport and theyre just so used to it that they dont even look any more about whos in the eastern conference in division X. I go, where are my Dallas Cowboys, who have they got next week and where do they sit in their conference?. Because I know if they win their conference it doesnt matter what else happens theyre going through to the playoffs.While Super Rugbys rusted-on supporters may long for the simple, compact days of Super 12, the reality is that Super Rugby, if it is to retain its mantle as the games premier provincial competition, must continue to develop new revenue streams as a means of combating the massive amounts of money on offer in Europe.That was achieved this year with the introduction of the Sunwolves (Japan) and Jaguares (Argentina), and the return of South Africas Southern Kings, taking the competition to 18 teams.With thousands of kilometres and 15 timezones separating the five countries -- the Sunwolves played three games in Singapore -- the logistics of travel, cost and player welfare meant Super Rugby had to delve deeper into the depths of conference-style sport.Super Rugby went conference style in 2011; it was the first real breakaway from that regular home-and-away fixture where we played everybody and it was due to, as you said, 15 timezones, SANZAAR chief Andy Marinos said.You just, you break everybody by going back to the round-robin format. If its important to the competition that we have the Argentinas and the Japans, and the South Africans and the Australians and the New Zealanders; if we want a truly global competition then round robin is disappearing pretty quickly. And thats without even looking at further expansion in five, 10, 20 years time..ddddddddddddWhat weve got now is a reality that were going to break the people [who] are playing the game by making them sit on planes more than theyre on the field. So when we made a conscious decision to grow the competition, the conference style really is about the only way you can do it sustainably without breaking people.Overall, SANZAAR reported positive feedback from most of the games major stakeholders with a global audience of 50 million watching on television and a further two million going through the gates. For the broadcasters, the addition of the Sunwolves and Jaguares added a freshness to the competition even if some of their results werent up to standard.Still a bold push into the United States doesnt appear to be on horizon anytime soon, despite the games administrators facing the reality of a continued player drain to Europe -- brought about by big-money television deals.Can you tell us how to get in, because everybody thinks the pot of gold is there and in the last 20 years no-ones been able to find it, Morris said.I think conceptually everyone thinks the United States is this great emerging market that everybodys desperate to get into; I think if you look in the media Pro12 are talking to them at the moment, All Blacks are taking another game up there this year, and the Maoris. So theres certainly a lot of development going in there.While admitting the States represented an attractive option for SANZAAR, Marinos said the governing body wouldnt be rushing into the market despite its obvious financial opportunities.Theres a lot of activity but I always liken the States to Argentina, he said.SANZAAR started its engagement with Argentina in 2007-2008, and thats an established rugby market; in saying that, professionalism wasnt embraced completely ... but it had a long rugby heritage and history, and they were competitive. From 2008 till they came into Super Rugby its eight years.Yes they came in at international level first, but they have been competing internationally and been at the table, they were semifinalists in 2007 at the World Cup; but that was a long process and that was setting high-performance structures, getting their Pampas team which is now their Pumas team, playing in the Vodacom Cup in South Africa, and they did that for four years, won it in the second year, finalists in their third year. So it was a process in order for them to be ready to compete in our competition structure.So my view is that America is a big market and theres a huge amount of opportunity, but youve got to get in there and youve got to strategically invest and build sustainability over a period of time so that when they do compete at the main table, they are competitive and they can continue to add value because thats the way you are going to pull supporters and the public in America, and the stakeholders in America, along because everyone wants to see a winner or a successful or competitive team.So I think thats how I see North America; its part of an ongoing development and investment for the long term. ' ' '