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Stars played 'stupid hockey' in loss to Blackhawks, says Ruff

Jerome Miron / USA Today Sports

Lindy Ruff got right to the point in his assessment of his team's play.

The Dallas Stars head coach had this to say following a 5-3 loss to Chicago on Saturday, per the team's official website:

It's a terrible loss. Especially after we took the lead, and we give their best player a free look and then we get a defenseman trapped on the go-ahead goal by them. That's not good hockey, it's stupid hockey. Not good hockey at all.

Here's what Ruff is referring to.

Jamie Benn and Tyler Seguin scored in the first half of the third period to give the Stars a 3-2 lead. Less than a minute after Seguin's goal, however, Patrick Kane was able to get behind John Klingberg to score a breakaway goal, while Klingberg was later taken out of the play by Artemi Panarin en route to a game-winning goal from Trevor van Riemsdyk.

"We didn't keep the game in front of us," Ruff continued. "If you look at (Kane's) goal, if we stay in proper position, that puck comes right to our defenseman. If we know Kane's on the ice, Kane doesn't get by us, Kane doesn't get around us on that play."

The loss gave the Stars a record of 2-2-2 in their past six games, all on home ice. Ruff stated that's just not good enough, especially in light of the fact Dallas wasn't able to hold onto leads.

With the loss, Dallas sits on 52 points in 53 games, six points behind Nashville for third place in the Central Division, and five points behind Calgary for the second wild-card spot.

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