The Dallas Stars have won both of their only ever meetings against the newly branded Utah Hockey Club.

After a narrow 2-1 win over Utah on December 2nd, the Stars were back in Salt Lake City just three weeks later.

Once again, it was another close matchup between the two teams, but Dallas came out on top by the same one-goal margin.

Goals from Collin Blackwell, Roope Hintz, and Jamie Been in addition to a strong performance in net from Casey DeSmith led the Stars to a 3-2 win on Monday night.

“We’ve had some games here in this stretch where we played pretty well but haven’t come up with wins,” Blackwell said.

“So to be able to shut it down at the end there, have some guys step up today and do really well, and then get those two points to kind of go [into the break] feeling good for the next segment coming back after the holidays. So it’s definitely a positive moving forward.”

Blackwell got the Stars on the board at 11:02 of the first period going bardown on a 2-1 breakaway feed from Sam Steel.

However, less than two minutes later Utah would tie the game when Kevin Stenlund tipped one past DeSmith to make it 1-1.

Midway through the second, Dallas regained the lead as Roope Hintz finished a feed from Mavrik Bourque tight in front of the net.

“It was huge. Huge for us,” Hintz said. “I haven’t played that well the last few games, so it was great to come back like that and find a way to win.”

Late in the second, the Stars padded their lead when captain Jamie Been found the scoresheet on a wraparound pass from Wyatt Johnston.

Dallas would need that goal as Utah tallied another late in the second on another deflected shot past Casey DeSmith.

However, it was DeSmith who made several key saves down the stretch as part of a strong 32-save night to close out the Stars win.

“Nobody wants to go into Christmas on a losing note,” DeSmith said. “Everybody wants to go home and be with their families and just feel good about hockey for a couple days, but get away from it as well.”

The Stars will be back in action on Friday when they take on the Minnesota Wild at American Airlines Center after the NHL’s 3 day Christmas break.