Game 1 WCQF AfterThoughts: Eight Is More than Enough of This

The Stars didn't play badly in this one, but that probably doesn't help you feel any better

You probably don’t want to hear this, but how about that goaltending performance by the opposing netminder?

It’s not that simple, of course. Like too many games in Edmonton last spring, Jake Oettinger didn’t play badly at all. He made some big saves, in fact, including withstanding a fearsome two-man advantage early on to keep the game well in-hand.

But Oettinger can’t score goals, and tonight, nobody else could for Dallas either, outside of a Roope Hintz bounce-shot on a power play after Mackenzie Blackwood had lost his stick.

When the Colorado netminder was fully equipped, he was unbeatable. And that meant stopping Wyatt Johnston all alone, Sam Steel on a tip-play off the rush, and Jamie Benn and Mason Marchment from what is supposed to be the most important scoring area of the ice.

Some of the shots hit him more than he got them, but that doesn’t matter in goaltending. Like in any boring office job, showing up is 95% of the work. And Blackwood kept himself sufficiently composed to be exactly where he needed to be.

The killer was the Marchment chance that would’ve made it 2-2. And you knew it was the killer because Colorado scored right after that when Devon Toews tapped in a puck on the back door like he was Evgenii Dadonov or something. If Cale Makar’s ding-dang defense partner is leading rushes and scoring huge playoff goals, then Dallas is going to need to stop making Blackwood look like a huge black hole, absorbing everything that gets near it.

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Pete DeBoer provided some mild drama by going to Alex Petrovic in Game 1 rather than waiting for two series to break the emergency glass. That decision resulted in two things: a familiar and steady partner for Lian Bichsel, and Thomas Harley playing more than half the first period.

Harley and Lindell both looked excellent in the first period, with Harley recovering on a MacKinnon rush to break up a 2-on-1, and Lindell doing yeoman’s work on the 5-on-3 kill. Harley also nailed a perfect target from Roope Hintz on the power play for the Stars’ only goal. Harley also played nearly 28 minutes in the first game of the playoffs.

“I thought we played maybe our best game in a month or two tonight,” Harley said afterwards. “And that’s hockey. Some things bounce off a skate, bounce off a glove, and end up in the back of the net. We’ll live with it and move on to Game 2.”

Here’s a chart showing when and for how long their various shifts took place. Click and inspect at your leisure.

Bichsel and Petrovic did end up logging about 12 minutes apiece when the final horn sounded, but make no mistake: Thomas Harley is going to need every second of rest he got down the stretch until Miro Heiskanen returns. And he’ll probably still need it after that, too.

Pete DeBoer may not have a full-blown Nils Lundkvist situation on his hands, but it’s clear enough that he’ll be asking everything of Thomas Harley that he has to give. I suppose we’ll see if the Stars’ top blueliner is up to the challenge of carrying the ever-increasing load.

“That’s the best game we’ve played in a month or two,” Harley reiterated tonight. “We forechecked hard, we defended well. So obviously it’s not ideal going down in a series. But there’s a reason it’s first to four.”

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Honestly, I don’t have a ton of negatives tonight, outside of the result. Pete DeBoer said something pretty true, I think, a little while ago. He mentioned that winning streaks turn into losing streaks before the losses actually start coming, and that losing streaks likewise get better in process before the results follow.

If tonight is the turn in the process, the Stars are in for something good—so long as the results are right behind them. And that needs to start on the power play, which got a goal right before their final chance ended, but really needed to chip in sooner in this game in order to give them more room to work with.

I mean, look at those six saves by Blackwood on the blue ground of shots from Rantanane, Johnston, Steel, and Seguin on the doorstep. That’s preposterous.

That Jamie Benn chance is another one that the Stars will score more often than not. Their power play—with Thomas Harley back on top after recent experiments with Mikael Granlund—generated plenty of looks. But when they finally cashed one in, it was a simple play, well-executed. The more complex looks that generated the best chances were either put into Blackwood, or kicked out by him.

It’s cruel, though. Dallas looked far worse in their overtime loss against Colorado last month, but after playing much better in a pretty even game, the Stars couldn’t capitalize on their chances, while the Avs made them pay. They’ll have to hope all the karmic retribution is over and done with after this one.

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On the Nathan MacKinnon lobbying efforts to get a penalty called on Roope Hintz, I’m of two minds. First, it’s absolutely a penalty, and the right call was made. That’s the thing every official wants to do: get the call right. And they did.

But man, it sure feels wrong to see MacKinnon channeling early-career Sidney Crosby and basically demanding that the officials call a penalty in order to invoke a video review to make the right call. Maybe that’s just the bed the NHL has created for itself these days, though.

“I don’t want to say too much,” said MacKinnon on the play. “Obviously they made the right call. It’s smart. They called it a penalty, and then they can just take it away if it’s a follow through. That’s why there’s a review there. I knew it was Hintz. It wasn’t Granlund. I saw the white tape on my face. Glad they got it right.”

If MacKinnon recusing himself/pleading the Fifth isn’t enough evidence of what happened here, I don’t know what to tell you. One of the best players in the NHL told the referees what to do with a bloodied face, and after they all chatted, they decided he probably had a point.

But if you’re Dallas, that’s not what you blame for losing this game, nor should you.

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The real kicker was the, uh, not-kicker named Artturi Lehkonen, whose goal probably was right to count given the new emphasis the NHL has placed on allowing more goals off skates. But man, if this play doesn’t look like a textbook fadeaway volley from a professional athlete, right?

“It did look a little bit like he kicked it,” DeBoer said after the game. “Obviously it wasn’t intentional. There was contact, and his foot kind of hit it. If he did kick it intentionally, he’s a hell of a soccer player, and it was a hell of a play. But I think the right call was made.”

DeBoer said the last part with a wry chuckle in a very composed press conference after the game. He also echoed Harley in saying that he thought the game was probably the Stars’ best in the last three or four weeks.

“We were pretty solid. It was one of those nights were I felt like we got a really good look, and they either got a save, or we missed,” DeBoer said afterward. “And then there was a couple going right back down. Two of ‘em were basically…one was off a foot, and one was off us.”

“I think we were a confident team through that whole game,” DeBoer said later on. “It’s 2-1 middle of the third period, and we’ve got a chance. I think Blackwood made the save…but that game’s a quarter of an inch from being tied 2-2 in the third period.”

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DeBoer also pointed out that the Stars can’t take eight minutes’ worth of penalties against Colorado, and certainly the Hintz high-stick was avoidable. Honestly, this felt like the way a close playoff game is always liable to go: awry, for one of the teams in the third period.

The real battle at this point will be to see if the Stars can continue fending off the Avalanche attack while finally burying the great chances they get. Blackwood had a wonderful game, but if the Stars can get to him in Game 2, there’s every chance he could go into Game 3 looking a bit more fragile, and a bit less composed. And if the games continue to be as tight as this one was, that might be enough to turn the series.

But, alas, the Stars will have to turn the series, once again. Because they did lose the opener to a lower-seeded team, once again.

They’ll hope they get a chance to fix that in a couple of weeks.

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It’s not great when a penalty kill is the loudest moment of the game, but man, it’s always so cool when a building explodes during play because of an organic moment. The Stars’ 5-on-3 kill early on gave the packed American Airlines Center every reason to release the accumulated tension, and you could feel it.

The Avalanche power play really doesn’t look nearly as good as it has in years past. You’d think that would bode really well for Dallas, but then again, they still got a power play goal because Nathan MacKinnon shoots the puck really hard, and hard shots from good areas can lead to favorable bounces, as the Avs’ second goal was.

MacKinnon was stopped in his tracks by Cody Ceci at one point, and Harley also made a beautiful poke check to subvert a rush chance from the star center. Lian Bichsel had a moment of Ganfald-in-Moria as well, and you can really draw a lot of confidence from frustrating a player like MacKinnon the way the Stars did.

Then again, the Avalanche can draw equal measures of confidence from how Cale Makar set up Toews for what probably should have been a goal off the rush, or how the Stars’ vaunted offense was silenced at even-strength by a goalie in his first playoff game ever.

If this series is about who feels better about their game right now, it’s probably tending towards Colorado. But if Dallas’s recent stretch was not a true representation of their playoff selves—and tonight showed they really can flip that switch—then perhaps the Stars can show Colorado that tonight’s result was merely a bump in the road that Dallas is going to end up controlling in the end, just like they did last year.

Scoring more goals will help. (This is called analysis, folks.)

Lineup

The Stars began the game with this lineup:

Granlund-Hintz-Dadonov
Marchment-Duchene-Seguin
Benn-Johnston-Rantanen
Bäck-Steel-Bourque

Lindell-Ceci
Harley-Lyubushkin
Bichsel-Petrovic

Oettinger in goal

Mackenzie Blackwood started in goal for Colorado in his first career NHL playoff game.

Gabriel Landeskog did not start for Colorado, who lined up like this:

Lehkonen-MacKinnon-Necas
Drouin-Nelson-Nichushkin
Kiviranta-Coyle-Colton
Kelly-Drury-O'Connor

Toews - Makar
Lindgren - Manson
Girard - Johnson

Erik Johnson drawing in for Sam Malinski was also a bit of a surprise, though I suppose veterans like Johnson (or Petrovic, for that matter) are always going to get a shot in the playoffs when coaches’ nerves are most frayed.

Game Beats

As per tradition, the Stars allowed the first few shots on goal of the game. It’s good to go with what you know, I suppose.

The first scary moment of the game came after a rebound was left in a bad spot, and Oettinger had to make a point-blank save that was followed by an icing. But despite the fourth line having to stay out for a defensive zone draw against the Avs’ top guys, they surivved.

In fact, the Stars even generated a rush of their own on a slick exit by Granlund and Dadonov, which led to Hintz getting a feed all alone off the rush that may have bounced on him, but it still required a corporeal presence from Blackwood.

Mason Marchment started off the game with a thundering hit, but he continued with a less-thundering penalty, tripping Cale Makar (who went down a bit easily) by putting his stick in a spot he ought to know better than to put it.

Wyatt Johnston then followed suit with a more egregious trip on Makar, who shook him loose at the blue line and got hauled down by Makar’s stick right in his skates. The Stars would have the bulk of two minors to kill at once.

However, the Stars also have Esa Lindell, who made a brilliant block by his net on an attempted back-door play. Lindell anticipated the play with his typically effortless brilliance, and he intercepted the puck and cleared it to delirious roars from the home crowd. Dallas would get through both penalties, giving them a glorious bit of momentum to build on.

That momentum continued with a great Esa Lindell chance from the slot that got deflected over the net. It grew even more when Matt Duchene drew a holding minor along the end boards on Josh Manson, who was unhappy about the call.

The power play created a couple of looks, but Blackwood didn’t quite leave his near post soon enough for a Johnston attempt. Blackwood then made a ten-bell stop on Benn from 25 feet out, though the puck may have ticked off Joel Kiviranta’s shinpad rather than going where Benn was sending it.

The Avs made it out with a penalty kill of their own to build on, but things stayed even for a bit, with Dallas looking more confident as the period went along.

Lian Bichsel wasn’t hurting for confidence either, putting enough of a body on MacKinnon at the blue line to slow down what looked like a dangerous zone entry from the Hart Trophy forward.

The Stars’ fourth line made a statement late in the first, taking the MacKinnon line and spending an entire shift in the Avalanche zone. Colorado would get one last look after a somewhat unnecessary Cody Ceci icing with five seconds to go, but Evgenii Dadonov donated one of the hands he used on an earlier wraparound attempt to the shot block, and the Stars went to the room nil-nil after 20 minutes, with Dadonov shaking his hands.

Overall, given the 5-on-3 Dallas had to kill early on, heading to the intermission with a tie score against this Avalanche team felt like a good result for Dallas.

Of course, what it took to get to that point was over 10 minutes of ice time from Thomas Harley, and just under the same ten-minute mark from Esa Lindell.

Bichsel (1:58) and Petrovic (2:11) barely played in the first period, which meant either that DeBoer wanted to ensure Colorado didn’t build momentum against the third pair, or that he had secretly turned Harley into a cyborg after Game 82 and was testing out some new firmware.

Second Period

Lian Bichsel caught Roope Hintz with a point shot two minutes into the period, sending Hintz back to the bench muttering Finnish words I certainly didn’t learn in November. And given Hintz’s injury last time the Avs faced the Stars in the playoffs, all eyes were on him until he took his next shift.

The Wyatt Johnston line (also feat. Benn & Rantanen) then gave Makar and Toews a minute of work in the Colorado zone in a solid bit of work that bled into a subsequent shift by the Duchene line, setting up a decent chance that Blackwood had to gather just before Marchment poked at the rebound.

Hintz’s next shift looked just fine, as his line forced Ryan Lindgren to panic and fling the puck over the glass and out of play from his own zone. Dallas would get another chance on the power play.

Duchene found Johnston down low for an easy chance to curl out in front of Blackwood, but Blackwood’s glove was there the entire time to smother the chance, and the Stars’ couldn’t generate any further Grade A’s, though they did cause some flurries in the crease.

The fourth line got some great looks of their own after the power play, but once again, Blackwood was in the right place at the right time. And the fourth line would then find itself in the wrong place at the worst time, on a goal that feels like karmic payback for Antoine Roussel’s goal against Minnesota in 2016 (trust me on this one).

As you can see in the replay, Artturi Lehkonen’s leg whips into the floating puck as he’s getting knocked over by Bourque. This would count as a shot on goal in soccer, but for the NHL’s purposes, this is not a “distinct kicking motion,” and the goal was upheld after review. Here’s what the rule says, via Scouting the Refs:

The word “deliberately” is doing all the lifting in that rule, and while I never doubt a professional athlete’s ability to “get something on the puck” even in the craziest of circumstances, the spirit of the rule is pretty clearly not to disallow goals called on the ice if it doesn’t look like a prototypical soccer pass. I mean, you be the judge.

Cale Makar nearly made it 2-0 on a gorgeous 3-on-2 rush where he beautifully beat a sweep check attempt from Lindell, but the tic-tac-toe passing play was finished with a shot over the net by Toews.

Cody Ceci broke up another 2-on-1 with Mackinnon and Nečas minutes later with a beautiful stick check at the perfect time.

A chaotic sequence came with five minutes to go when Nathan MacKinnon’s face intercepted Roope Hintz’s stick. And on his way off the ice, MacKinnon lobbied hard for a penalty that had not been called or seen by anybody. But with MacKinnon’s face leaking, the officials rightly judged that Something Had Happened, and they ended up huddling up and calling a double minor on Hintz in order to take a look at the replay in order to ensure they got the call right.

They would indeed get the call correct, of course. But that didn’t make it any less maddening for Dallas fans in the building, to whom it seemed like MacKinnon had convinced the officials to make a call they hadn’t been planning to make.

And predictably, it was MacKinnon who scored on another fluky goal, as his shot from the circle went into Lyubushkin’s lap, fluttering off and against the grain, perfectly underneath Oettinger’s glove.

It was a tough pill for Dallas to swallow, but they nearly got one back on a shorthanded rush and tip attempt by Sam Steel during the second minor. But Blackwood continued to be perfect, and the Stars went to the dressing room with a dour mood and a 2-0 deficit.

Third Period

Mason Marchment drew a power play that Dallas absolutely had to convert five minutes into the third, after some hard work by the Duchene line. Josh Manson got Marchement high and late with what was called interference, as one of his gloves caught Marchment in the chin on the two-handed hit up high. Marchment was upended quite visibly, but the penalty was given, and Dallas would capitalize in the final moments.

After a flurry at the net where Blackwood lost his stick, Johnston put in some crucial work to dig the puck out of the white sleeve at the base of the goal to keep play moving. Then a point shot by Harley was deflected down into the ice by Hintz, and it was a one-goal game with barely a second left on the power play.

It was a must-have for the Stars, and it gave the building life and the bench hope as the tense third period progressed.

After Oettinger held onto a shot to snuff out a minute-plus of extended work by Makar, the Stars got a rush chance that saw Blackwood once again come up big enough to hold the fort. Rantanen found himself one-on-one in transition against Lindgren, and Rantanen dipped a shoulder and sent Lindgren tumbling into another dimension as he suddenly pulled up and fed a puck into the slot for a lethal one-timer, and Alex Petrovic gave it a go.

It was a good enough shot, and the Stars scrambled for the rebound, but without success.

The biggest save came from Blackwood’s torso on Marchment, who got a chance that looked like a sure-goal from the guts of the slot, only for his puck to beat Blackwood’s blocker hand and bounce off his armpit and just wide.

That would be even worse to revist moments later, when Rantanen lost the puck in the offensive zone and the Avs’ defensemen joined the rush to go on a 4-on-2 chance that the two defensemen connected for against the outnumbered defenders.

Manson found Toews on the back door, and it was a tap-in for a 3-1 lead that would be more than enough.

There was a fourth goal into an empty net with 3:08 to go after MacKinnon fended off a Granlund stick check to get a shot away that MacKinnon is never going to miss. But that wasn’t really the final dagger, because the Stars wanted to make sure this game felt like Game 1’s are supposed to feel.

Charlie Coyle benefited from a gorgeous assist from Jack Drury, who sent a Parker Kelly shot across the crease from between his legs to Coyle, wide-open on the back door.

One can’t help but think that the Stars, down 3-1, well and truly turned garbage time into landfill time. (Note to past self watching the Vancouver game: that is what garbage time is supposed to look like.)

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So the Stars dropped Game 5-1, and now they have an 8:30/8:55pm puck drop on Monday in an attempt to salvage a split at home before two tough games in Colorado.

There is consolation in the process, as the Stars were a whisker from a 2-2 game in the third. But when your biggest positive is that you nearly tied the game at one point, it’s hard to hear that in the wake of eight consecutive negatives—both this season, and in four straight postseasons.