Stars 3, Ducks 1

DALLAS (AP) -The Dallas Stars reversed their recent habit of slow starts and were rewarded with a home win over a Pacific Division rival.

Brenden Morrow scored a power-play goal just over two minutes after the opening faceoff, Mike Ribeiro and Jere Lehtinen each had a goal and an assist, and the Stars went on to a 3-1 victory over the Anaheim Ducks on Saturday night.

Morrow notched his fourth of the season at 2:04 of the opening period, striking from the slot off a centering pass by Ribeiro, and Dallas maintained that advantage the rest of the way.

"It's important to stay disciplined and have good starts," Ribeiro said. "It was probably our best game. It's important to get out of the gate quick and take the lead. The last two games it's been a bad start."

Marty Turco made 20 saves as Dallas improved to 3-0-1 at home.

"He was very solid, very good," Stars coach Dave Tippett said of his goaltender. "That's got to be a staple of our team, our goaltenders have got to play very well. We expect that from them every night."

Chris Pronger scored a power-play goal for the defending Stanley Cup champion Ducks, winless on the road (0-4-1).

Anaheim coach Randy Carlyle faulted his team's poor coverage in the slot on Morrow's momentum-building goal.

"We were out of position and left Morrow alone in front of the net," Carlyle said. "He didn't get a good shot at it but it trickled through and went in the net."

Ribeiro made it 2-0 at 7:48 of the second period, jamming a loose puck past goaltender Jean-Sebastien Giguere while the Stars had an extra attacker because of a delayed penalty on the Ducks.

Lehtinen extended the lead to 3-0 at 10:01 of the second period with his first goal of the season, and at that point, Carlyle replaced Giguere with Ilya Bryzgalov. Dallas' Philippe Boucher dumped the puck into the Anaheim zone and it bounced hard off the end boards and onto the stick of Lehtinen, who fired a shot past Giguere from the inner part of the right circle.

"They had three goals in 11 shots," Carlyle said of the goalie change. "We hung our goalie out to dry. We were looking for some kind of spark."

Lehtinen was Dallas' top goal-scorer last season with 26, but he was having trouble finding the net and was a minus-five entering Saturday night.

"It's nice to get on the board," Lehtinen said. "I was in the right place at the right time. We knew we had to play hard against the champs."

Pronger got Anaheim's only goal with his first of the season at 18:24 of the second period while the Ducks held a two-man advantage.

The Ducks have managed two goals or less in four of their road losses, and Pronger knows that must change if Anaheim is to be a Cup contender again this season.

"You've got to keep working to get out of your funk and your lack of goal-scoring," Pronger said. "We've got to keep working hard in those high-traffic areas.(Turco) played well and we didn't execute very well and do the little things you need to do to win."

Notes: Stars C Mike Modano remains four points short of matching Phil Housley's points record of 1,232 for U.S.-born players. Modano has only two points in eight games this season. ...The Ducks were without injured RW Todd Bertuzzi (concussion) and D Mathieu Schneider (ankle). C Todd Marchant was back in the Anaheim lineup after missing two games due to an ankle injury. ...Dallas began a stretch of 10 of its next 11 games against Pacific Division competition. ...The Ducks assigned C Petteri Wirtanen to Portland of the AHL. Wirtanen made his NHL debut on Oct. 17, scoring his first career goal against Nashville. ... Turco played in his 325th game for the Stars, tying Jon Casey for third among goaltenders in franchise history. Cesare Maniago is the leader with 420 games.