FRISCO – Mike Modano spent a lot of his youth at Joe Louis Arena.

The home site for Little Caesars Pizza's storied youth hockey program, "The Joe" was a special place for the young Modano, who grew up in the suburbs of Detroit.

"We played games there, tournaments, we loved just going there for practice," Modano said. "Yeah, I have a lot of great memories there."

Modano will try to draw on those memories today when he and his Stars teammates try to stay alive in the playoffs. Dallas is down, 3-1, in its best-of-7 Western Conference finals series with the Red Wings.

But instead of yielding to the pressure of possible elimination, the Stars are trying to enjoy the moment.

"When you were kids playing, and you made up the score in a game, you never said, 'Oh, we're up 4-0, and there's the horn, and we win,'" defenseman Mattias Norstrom said. "No, you were always coming from behind, you were always doing the impossible. That's what made it fun."

Norstrom acknowledged that no team goes into a series wanting to be behind, but he said that you have to live in the moment and embrace the challenge. Dallas lost the first three games of the series, and only twice in 153 opportunities have NHL teams come back from 3-0 deficits. The Toronto Maple Leafs did it in 1942 and the New York Islanders did it in 1975.

"We are where we are right now, and because of that, we have the chance to make history," he said. "So why not go out and try to make history."

Dallas is 0-4 at Joe Louis Arena this season, and goalie Marty Turco is 0-9-2 in his NHL career in Detroit. What's more, the Red Wings had the NHL's best regular-season home record (29-9-3) and are 7-0 on home ice in the playoffs with an impressive 25-9 advantage in goals.

So, yeah, the hill is steep.

"It's a situation where we haven't got the job done there, but if you look at it from the glass is half full ... we're overdue," Stars coach Dave Tippett said after practice Friday.

Tippett said he has been impressed with the way the Stars have handled pressure all season. The players have a routine where they play a hybrid version of volleyball over a four-foot high net using only soccer skills (feet, head, chest) before each game.

"That's when the juices get flowing," captain Brenden Morrow said.

Tippett said he has caught himself smiling at how loose his team can be.

"You see guys giggling like 12-year-olds sometimes, and it really is just like when they were kids," he said.

Modano understands that philosophy. He will turn 38 in June and is the oldest player on the Stars' roster. He admits there are times when he's tired of the travel or the practices or the media grind, but he says he's never tired of the games.

"Are you kidding," he said with a smile. "If I could just show up and play the games, I'd play for the rest of my life."

Modano will take that attitude into Game 5, remembering his days with Little Caesars, much like Turco might call on his success at Joe Louis Arena playing for the University of Michigan (he was 18-5 there with the Wolverines) or Steve Ott might recall games played across the Detroit River with the Windsor Spitfires.

"It's just a hockey game," Ott said. "It's supposed to be fun."