ST. PAUL, Minn. – The spiral down continued Thursday for the Dallas Stars and Marty Turco, who allowed three Minnesota goals on the first four shots he faced and was pulled 13:14 into the game.

Dallas went on to lose 6-3 – its third loss in a row – and fell to 23-16-4 (50 points). Minnesota, meanwhile, moved to 23-15-2 (48 points) and closed the gap in a tightening Western Conference.

"For us to be a good team, we have to have all the pieces in place, and we're missing a lot of pieces right now," Stars coach Dave Tippett said. "It's just as simple as that."

While the Stars are missing injured players such as Sergei Zubov, Jere Lehtinen, Jussi Jokinen and Philippe Boucher, Tippett was referring to the product on the ice.

Dallas made mistakes in all phases of the game. The struggling power play has not scored in four games and is 0-for-16 in that span. It had two chances in the first period, resulting only in a short-handed goal for the Wild.

Marian Gaborik broke in and scored on Turco when the Stars' goalie made a failed attempt at a poke check. Turco, who struggled in Detroit the night before, then allowed goals to Pavol Demitra and Pierre-Marc Bouchard in the next 3:24. He was pulled in favor of backup goalie Mike Smith.

When asked if Turco might need an extended break, Tippett said: "I don't know. We'll see."

Smith made some key saves to keep the Stars in the game, but he was beat on a Gaborik shot in the first period, yielded a power-play goal to Eric Belanger in the second and also was beat late in the game by Mark Parrish.

As Tippett said, it was a little bit of everything. The goaltending wasn't great and the special teams play was below par. The top lines were better than they were in Detroit the night before, but they did not carry the game.

"It's everything," Tippett said. "Every part of our game."

Stars center Mike Modano, who helped set up Steve Ott on a second period goal, said it has been very tough for the Stars to create offense lately.

"Ability with the puck right now is not really good," Modano said. "It just seems to be a real struggle to just get the puck up and down the ice."

As a result, the Stars are giving up the first goal and playing from behind against strong defensive teams.

"They got the lead early and they kept on coming, and we didn't really adjust until the middle of the second period," defenseman Stephane Robidas said. "You can't let a team like that get the lead. That's been their model for years."

Of course, the Wild also was motivated to follow that model. They lost an 8-3 game in Dallas last week and wanted a little measure of revenge.

"We knew how we played the last game in Dallas. We kind of struggled," Demitra said. "We obviously prepared for this game."

Now, the Stars will get the same opportunity for revenge. They play host to Detroit on Saturday and will see the Wild again Monday at home.

Zubov will test his hand injury today and could be back in the lineup against Detroit. However, the Stars say they have to be ready even if he isn't.

"He's a great player, but we're certainly capable of winning games with the lineup we have right now," said rookie defenseman Matt Niskanen, who scored a goal in his return to his home state. "Right now, I don't think we're giving a complete effort as a group for a full 60 minutes.

"We definitely have the people in here that should be able to get it done. We'll get it turned around."