Full coverage: Dallas Stars take down Colorado Avalanche with OT winner in Game 2
Stars owner confirms team cut ties with employees who profited booking youth tournaments
It’s a new series between Dallas and Colorado.
Despite a lopsided loss to the Avalanche on Saturday, the Dallas Stars evened the series on home ice Monday night with a 4-3 victory. Colin Blackwell scored the game-winner for the Stars with 2:14 remaining in the first overtime period.
Dallas trailed 3-2 entering the third period, but Evgenii Dadonov scored the game-tying goal with 9:47 remaining in regulation. The Stars survived a Colorado power play in the final minutes of regulation and the opening minute of overtime, and Blackwell was able to give the Stars their first win of the playoffs and snap their eight-game losing streak.
The series is now tied 1-1 as it heads to Denver for Game 3 on Wednesday night.
Here are five thoughts from the Stars’ win:
The Stars were in some trouble.
Through two games of this series, Dallas has led for just 1:02 and entered the third period of Monday’s game in a deficit.
But after Jamie Benn, Wyatt Johnston and Dadonov came together to force overtime, Blackwell was the hero in OT.
Just a game after he was a healthy scratch, Blackwell picked up a loose puck and went top shelf for the win.
Heading to Ball Arena down 0-2 could’ve been detrimental for the Stars. Colorado has a 26-12-3 record in its arena this year. The Avalanche also are on the verge of returning captain Gabriel Landeskog for the first time since June 2022.
His return could’ve given Colorado the energy to sweep the series. But Monday’s win means that no matter what happens in Denver, the series will return to Dallas.
During last year’s playoff run, Dallas’ fourth line was responsible for some of its most memorable plays, including Radek Faksa’s Game 7 winner in the Vegas series.
While most of the players on that line are new this season, they provided a similar spark Monday night.
Blackwell drew into the lineup for Mavrik Bourque and skated alongside Oskar Bäck and Sam Steel. The fourth line combined for four shots on goal, 10 hits in regulation, plus the second-period score with Steel and Bäck assisting on Thomas Harley’s goal to give Dallas its first lead of the series.
The line then combined for Blackwell’s game winner in OT.
Dallas also got a critical goal from its third line. Dadonov — who has played on every line this season, but spent most of his time in the bottom six — was demoted from the top line to the third line mid-game Monday. He cleaned up a loose puck off a shot by Johnston with 9:47 left in regulation to tie it 3-3.
While Dallas needs more contributions from its top scorers, its depth could be an advantage deeper in this series.
Most nights, the Stars wouldn’t complain all that much after going 1 for 4 on the power play.
Dallas opened its scoring on the man advantage with under a minute left in the first period. Tyler Seguin scored for the Stars to tie the game entering the first intermission.
But from there, Dallas’ power play went cold at a time when it was most needed.
Tied 2-2, the Stars spent six of the last 10 minutes of the second period on the power play. Interference calls on Joel Kiviranta and Josh Manson and a tripping call on Logan O’Connor swung the momentum in the Stars’ direction.
But even with seven seconds of 5-on-3 and plenty of 5-on-4 time, the Stars were unable to score. Instead, O’Connor came down ice and scored a stunning backhanded goal in transition with 33 seconds left in the period to shift the momentum back in Colorado’s direction.
Dallas took just two penalties in the contest and held Colorado to 1 for 3 on the power play, but Nathan MacKinnon scored on the Avalanche’s first attempt.
In the six-game series between Colorado and Dallas last year, the Avalanche’s top player Nathan MacKinnon had just two goals and five points.
By three and a half periods of this year’s series, he had already surpassed his goal total with three, and he has recorded four assists.
The reigning Hart Trophy winner and candidate to repeat has scored power-play goals in both games for the Avalanche, scoring Colorado’s first goal of the night Monday.
Last year, Dallas had lockdown defensemen Miro Heiskanen and Chris Tanev to help contain him. But with Heiskanen injured and Tanev off in Toronto, the Stars need to find a new way to contain Colorado’s superstar — or return Heiskanen to the lineup fast.
Tyler Seguin only played his third game back from hip surgery Monday night, but showed his return was a crucial one for Dallas.
With less than a minute left in the first period, Seguin scored a power-play goal to tie the score 1-1.
It was his first goal since Nov. 29, with his last also coming against Colorado.
Stars coach Pete DeBoer said he expected it to take a few games for Seguin’s conditioning to get back to where it was, but he delivered a much-needed play for the Stars at a critical time.
Find more Stars coverage from The Dallas Morning News here.
Dallas police are searching for a shooting suspect after two people were shot early Saturday morning.
The shooting incident happened around 6:30 a.m. when Dallas officers responded to a shooting call in the 7600 block of South Central Expressway, where two people had been shot.
Officials said one victim was taken to the hospital in critical condition by Dallas Fire-Rescue. The other was transported by private vehicle in stable condition.
No arrests have been made as of Saturday afternoon, according to Dallas Police.
The shooting investigation is ongoing and this story will be updated as we learn more.
UPDATE 6-26-2026: Gracie has been found about four miles south of the Cedar Hollow Ranch, according to a Facebook update from Real County Animal Rescue. Ranch manager Vic Jones has assembled a team to safely bring the wandering giraffe home.
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A giraffe named Gracie is missing in Texas, and the search for her has become a tall order.
Gracie, who is about 3 years old, has been missing for nearly two weeks after escaping her enclosure at Cedar Hollow Ranch in the Texas Hill Country, said Vic Jones, who owns the remote property about 100 miles west of San Antonio. He said Wednesday, June 24 that Gracie had wandered into a part of the privately owned preserve that other giraffes previously avoided.
Jones said he has sent up helicopters to look for Gracie, a few sightings have trickled in, and a $5,000 reward is on the table.
But the giraffe, which stands roughly the height of a tree, hasn’t turned up.
“She wound up going up and feeding in an area on the hillside and the rocky ledges that none of the other giraffes had ever gone on before,” Jones said. “And when she came down off of there, she came down on the wrong side of the gate.”
The ranch is in rural Real County, where its roughly 2,700 residents were put on alert to be on the lookout for a missing giraffe. Jones said the search area is extremely remote, and the likelihood of Gracie encountering any humans is low.
“People are not in danger of her because she’s not around people,” Jones said. ‘She’s out in very, very rough, heavily wooded lands.”
The Texas Hill Country has one of the largest concentrations of exotic captive animals in the country. Real County Sheriff Nathan Johnson said the mild climate and rugged terrain seems to serve as a good stand-in for most of the animals’ native African environments.
He rattled off a list of animals that have gone missing over the years, especially after floods, but said this was his first giraffe.
“I’ve had wildebeests, I’ve had water buffalo, I’ve had monkeys, I’ve had zebras, all go missing,” Johnson said. “Sometimes we recover them, and sometimes we don’t.”
While the middle of Texas is not a giraffe’s native environment, Jones said Gracie should be able to find plenty of leaves and other vegetation to eat. He said other animals were not likely to bother her.
Jones said he initially had helicopters searching an area of about 7,500 acres (3,000 hectares) with no luck. A few days later, there was a report that Gracie was spotted to the south.
But by the time they could search the area, Jones said, she was already gone.
“We’re always two three days late for where the information is coming from, so that makes it tough,” Jones said.
Editor’s note: See all updated scenarios for the 2026 World Cup tournament bracket
The most volatile group has come to a close at the 2026 World Cup.
Egypt and Iran played to a 1-1 draw late on Friday night, which allowed Belgium to rise up from third place all the way to the top spot in the group while Egypt took second. Iran will have to wait and see if their third place finish is good enough to qualify for the knockout round.
As the Group G runner up, Egypt will take on Australia in the round of 32.
SHOP: Egypt vs. Australia 2026 World Cup tickets
Australia finished as the second-place team in Group D, sitting on four points. Egypt and Australia will face off in Dallas on Friday, July 3, the final match of the round of 32.
Here is everything you need to know in order to buy Egypt vs. Australia World Cup tickets.
Shop Egypt vs. Australia tickets
As of publication, the cheapest ticket to attend the Egypt vs. Australia costs $834. Lower-level seats for the round of 32 match at AT&T Stadium in Dallas start at $1,083.
Egypt will take on Australia in the round of 32. Australia finished as the runner up in Group D, finishing the group stage with one win, one draw and one loss.
Shop Egypt vs. Australia tickets
| TEAM | POINTS | RECORD |
| Belgium | 5 | 1-2-0 |
| Egypt | 5 | 1-2-0 |
| Iran | 3 | 0-3-0 |
| New Zealand | 1 | 0-1-2 |
Shop Egypt vs. Australia World Cup tickets
Shop Egypt vs. Australia tickets
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