Jamie Benn sparks Stars after J.T. Miller scrap

Along the glass, Benn and Miller got tied up low in the zone while two linesmen jumped in fast. A helmet sat loose on the ice, the crowd stood up behind the glass, and the whole sequence felt like a captain trying to reset the bench.

That mattered because the Stars were stuck in a grind. New York had clogged the middle early, kept Dallas to the outside, and turned the afternoon into a slow, heavy game.

Benn still carries weight in those moments. He has 15 goals and 20 assists for 35 points in 57 games, and Dallas does not ask him to drive every shift anymore. It still asks him to set the tone.

Miller was never going to back off. The Rangers forward came into the game with 17 goals and 34 assists for 51 points in 64 games, and Mike Sullivan has leaned on him as one of the club's loudest competitive voices.

So this was not empty noise. It was two veteran names trying to grab the emotional edge in a game that had almost no room at 5-on-5.

Dallas needed that edge more. The Stars were at home, they were chasing another tight win, and their captain made sure the bench stayed in it instead of waiting for a clean skill play that was not coming.

The bigger point is what followed. Dallas found its breakthrough in the third period and finished off a 2-0 win, with Jason Robertson scoring his 43rd goal on the power play before adding the empty-netter late.

Jake Oettinger did the rest. He stopped 22 shots and posted his 4th shutout of the season, which made every hard shift and every post-whistle battle worth even more for Dallas.

For the Rangers, the frustration is obvious. They held the Stars scoreless for nearly 53 minutes, then lost the special-teams battle and left Dallas with nothing to show for a strong defensive stretch.

That is the split in this story. New York dropped another one and sat at 33-37-9, while Dallas improved to 47-20-12 and locked up 2nd place in the Central.

Benn did not need a goal to leave a mark on this one. In a low-event game with very little space, he found another way to matter, and Dallas followed him.