DALLAS (AP) -- Ed Belfour stopped 17 shots behind a brilliant defense as the Dallas Stars clinched a berth in the Western Conference finals with a 2-1 victory over the Edmonton Oilers on Saturday night.
Greg Adams scored on a 2-on-1 break with 2:26 left in the game to clinch the victory, wrapping up their best-of-7 semifinal series in five games.
Derian Hatcher scored the Stars' other goal in the first period.
Belfour was on the verge of his fifth career playoff shutout and second of the series, but the Oilers scored on Bill Guerin's goal from the slot with 29 seconds to play. Oilers coach Ron Low pulled goaltender Curtis Joseph with two minutes to go, and Edmonton capitalized on Guerin's seventh goal of the playoffs.
The Oilers then forced a faceoff in the Dallas zone with nine seconds left, getting a decent shot off that was steered aside by Belfour.
It was Belfour's 43rd playoff victory and improved his record to 8-3 in this post-season.
The Stars will meet the winner of the St. Louis-Detroit series. Detroit holds a 3-1 lead and can wrap things up Sunday afternoon in Detroit.
It's the first time the Stars have reached the conference finals since the franchise moved to Dallas from Minnesota five years ago. The Minnesota North Stars made it all the way to the Stanley Cup finals twice, losing both times.
Edmonton knocked the Stars out of the playoffs with a first-round upset last season. The Stars finished with the NHL's best regular-season record.
Because of Belfour and Oilers goalie Curtis Joseph, the first period had proved crucial for most of the series.
Joseph's shutout of Dallas in game two was the seventh of his playoff career and third of the 1998 post-season.
This game, too, turned into a low-scoring game.
Dallas' first shot on goal didn't come until midway through the first period.
Hatcher, the Stars' captain, scored with 4.7 seconds left in the first period on a wrist shot from the bottom of the right circle.
The goal came 48 seconds after Edmonton's Greg de Vries went to the penalty box for interference, giving Dallas its third power play of the period.
To that point, the Oilers had dominated Dallas, outshooting the Stars 8-3.
The momentum carried over, and the Stars fired eight straight shots in the first seven minutes of the second period.
Dallas had a 11-4 shots-on-goal advantage in the second period. Edmonton went 9:26 of the second period before its first shot.
The Oilers' best chance of the first two periods came with about three minutes to go in the second period. Defenseman Roman Hamrlik's 30-foot slap shot hit the right goal post.
Then, with 6:30 left in the game, defenseman Janne Niinimaa hit the left post.
The Stars made a serious rush at the Edmonton goal with four minutes left, but Joseph stopped a close-in shot of Benoit Hogue, who scored both goals in Dallas' 2-1 victory in game four.
The hungry Dallas sellout crowd of 16,928 had only 90 seconds to wait, however, for the game-clincher from Adams.
Belfour and the Dallas defense continued to befuddle the Oilers. Edmonton scored just four goals in the five-game series.
Stars left wing Jamie Langenbrunner was scratched before the game with a sore shoulder. Club officials say he'll be evaluated day to day.
#3 DETROIT RED WINGS vs #4 ST. LOUIS BLUES
DETROIT (AP) -- The St. Louis Blues are going home, but they won't be calling for tee times. Not yet, anyway.
The Blues avoided elimination from the Stanley Cup playoffs with a 3-1 victory over Detroit on Sunday.
"Maybe we were a little more relaxed," said St. Louis goaltender Grant Fuhr, the game's No. 1 star. "But we don't have any choice, really. If we don't keep winning, it's over."
Geoff Courtnall, Mike Eastwood and Todd Gill blew the game open with second-period goals against the Red Wings, who still hold a 3-2 edge in the Western Conference semifinal series.
Game 6 in the best-of-7 series -- the last in the NHL to be settled -- will be played Tuesday night in St. Louis with Game 7, if necessary, back at Joe Louis Arena on Thursday night.
"We get to go home now," Fuhr said. "We need to put in a good effort. We've got a second chance."
Fourteen teams have come back from a 3-1 deficit to win a best-of-7 series, most recently the Edmonton Oilers over the Colorado Avalanche in the first round of this year's playoffs.
Sergei Fedorov was not much of a factor. He had two takeaways and two giveaways. The St. Louis defense shadowed his every move and knocked Fedorov down almost every time he touched the puck.
"We never got anything going on the power play," said Fedorov, who had four of Detroit's 30 shots on Fuhr. "We weren't getting enough shots on goal."
The Blues, who swept the Los Angeles Kings in the first round, turned the game around with goals by Courtnall and Eastwood in the first 2:58 of the second period. Gill's power-play goal at 9:21 gave St. Louis a 3-0 lead.
"I think for us to get the lead was big," Courtnall said. "They're awful tough to catch when they've got a lead."
Martin LaPointe finally ended Fuhr's shutout bid with a short-handed goal at 11:03 of the second. It was the only mistake by Fuhr, who faced a withering barrage of shots in the third period as Detroit tried to storm back. The Red Wings outshot St. Louis 30-23.
"That's Grant Fuhr. He's awesome," St. Louis forward Jim Campbell said. "He's won five Stanley Cups. Today, you saw why."
Detroit, bidding to become the first team to repeat as Stanley Cup champions since the Pittsburgh Penguins in 1991 and 1992, outshot the Blues 8-7 in the first period and seemed to be in control.
But the Blues, who scored 16 goals in their first-round sweep, came out with more determination and began swarming Detroit goaltender Chris Osgood right from the start in the second period.
"The only thing we can do is keep shooting pucks at that kid," Gill said. "He's a darn good goaltender. He's tough to beat."
Marc Bergevin, doing a nice job of keeping the puck inside the blue line, threw a long shot toward Osgood which Courtnall deflected high into the net on the goalie's stick side at 1:44.
Eastwood's first playoff goal went between Osgood's legs for a 2-0 lead at 2:58.
The Red Wings, who have eliminated St. Louis from the playoffs each of the last two years, got caught with too many men on the ice at 7:24. Gill, from the top of the slot, blasted a slap shot past Osgood for his second playoff goal with three seconds left in the penalty.
"We got some bounces today," Gills said. "That helped us get some pucks behind Osgood."
Lapointe's third goal came off a feed from Steve Yzerman, who fought his way around two defenders and into the St. Louis zone.
