from Stephen Whyno of the CP at Yahoo,

St. Louis Blues general manager Doug Armstrong targeted Paul Stastny in free agency. But before he even had the chance to sign him, the Dallas Stars traded for Jason Spezza.

"I've got to say I was a little bit nervous this morning when Dallas made their acquisition what our Plan B would be," Armstrong said.

Such is life in the Western Conference, where contending teams are playing an escalating game of "Can you top this?" specifically down the middle of the ice. Having a strong one-two punch of centres is necessary given the Los Angeles Kings' duo of Anze Kopitar and Jeff Carter and now the Anaheim Ducks' combination of Ryan Getzlaf and Ryan Kesler.

"If you want to be one of the elite teams, you have to have it," Stars GM Jim Nill said. "You look at the other teams that are winning on our side now, you need to have two elite centremen."

Nill came from the Detroit Red Wings, who won Stanley Cups thanks in part to having Steve Yzerman and Sergei Fedorov and later Henrik Zetterberg and Pavel Datsyuk. In Dallas now, he has Tyler Seguin and Spezza.

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