Game 3 WCF AfterThoughts: Jason Robertson, Jason Robertson, Jason Robertson
And I finally see myself
Through the eyes of no one else
It’s so exhausting on this silver screen
Where I play the role of anyone but me
***
Someone must have said his name three times, because Jason Robertson showed up on Monday night, and he’ll be sticking around in the Edmonton Oilers nightmares for a while.
It’s only 2-1 in the series now, but man, that one has to sting for Edmonton, doesn’t it? You come out and look like the best team in the world for 20 minutes, shaking Dallas’s confidence despite getting Roope Hintz back in the lineup, and then the Stars promptly roar back in the second period to rip your momentum to shreds and toss it out the window.
Then you get a depth goal to tie things up late in the second period from Adam Henrique, and you have life. Like the Stars the other night, you feel fortunate to have gotten through a tough period with the game still within reach. And then you hit a post! Surely one of your Hart Trophy winners will step up and win you the game, right?
Instead, Jason Robertson poked a hole in Stuart Skinner, and in your hopes and dreams, and that was that. After all the raucous joy of the fantastic start, this has to make you re-think just about everything, doesn’t it? For the second game in a row, Dallas took it over as things went on. For the second game in a row, Dallas’s goaltending was better. And now you’re down 2-1 in a series where you haven’t even won in regulation yet.
For the Stars’ part, you have to marvel at how many ways they’ve found to win games, even if this one was essentially just unboxing Roope Hintz and letting him mash the JASON ROBERTSON button three times in a row. They didn’t get a power play until late, and they didn’t do much with it. But they didn’t need it either, because their penalty kill was good enough, and because Jason Robertson was great.
It’s worth admiring how different each of the Robertson goals were, too. The first one involved a great keep by Hintz and a lethal one-timer by Robertson from a little ways out. The second goal was a deft backhand after a scrum, all of which happened because Robertson made a solid keep at the blue line. Then the third goal was just a confident player against a struggling goalie, and now the Oilers have a tough choice to make about Game 4.
Knoblauch has already gone to Calvin Pickard once. Does he do it again, with the Oilers facing the possibility of a 3-1 deficit if the Stars do what they’ve done in their two prior series and win Games 3 and 4 on the road? Certainly Edmonton radio will be talking about it, now. Certainly Edmonton has more questions to answer now than problems to pose for Dallas. That’s a delicate place to be in a series.
Miro Heiskanen doesn’t get enough credit from the wider hockey world, and perhaps not enough from his team’s own fans, either. He is on track to be someone you talk about in the same breath as Joe Nieuwendyk, however, and that’s because his greatness is so persistent, so inevitable, that you go from taking it for granted to wanting to hang a plaque on it.
But Esa Lindell is probably the underrated player right now, as he led the team in ice team, sent Mason Marchment in on a wonderful breakaway pass, and ended the night plus-one despite the onslaught he faced in the first period. Lindell suffered much last season from being paired with third-pairing defensemen, but now that Chris Tanev has bolstered the defense corps, Lindell has been playing like a top-pairing defenseman no matter whom he’s facing. He’s playing the second-most minutes per game on the Stars roster, he’s chippped in with two goals and two assists, he’s plus-2, and he’s only taken two penalties all postseason. Tonight, he played with Heiskanen, and he weathered a tough Oilers push to come out the other side with flying colors.
None of those individual facts, on its own, tells you the whole picture. But all of them put together paint the picture of an extremely reliable defenseman who has allowed the Stars to play with essentially a five-man group against the best the West has to offer.
Anyway, this was Jason Robertson night, and he deserves to have us take this journey with him once again. By the way, all three of Robertson’s goals were scored with either Draisatl (1) or McDavid (2) on the ice, which Seems Good to Me! I wonder if the Edmonton media will feel similarly.
Okay, here’s how it all happened
***
The first period was marked by the Stars having to answer the big question of this series: could they withstand the Oiler’s top line long enough to beat them with depth? But instead of answering the question, the Stars ended up posing one of their own, and answering it as well: Is it possible to start even more slowly than they did in Game 2, and still win? They answered with a resounding Very Yes, Somehow.
Things started poorly when Connor McDavid took a shot after peeling out from behind the net, and the puck glanced off Heiskanen’s skate, fluttering just wide of the net only to run into Hyman, who was in the paint behind Oettinger, and bouncing into the net. It all came off a sequence that started off a Ryan Suter dropped stick as he attempted to defend an entry, so it’s safe to say that everyone except Jake Oettinger would’ve liked a do-over on that one. (Suter also had a rough penalty later in the second period, but unlike last postseason, the team was able to pick him up and move past his mistakes in this one.)
ZACH HYMAN OPENS THE SCORING IN GAME 3! pic.twitter.com/ybiqQLrKNg
— Sportsnet (@Sportsnet) May 28, 2024
Then things went from “bad” to “still bad” when Alex Petrovic was the victim of home ice matchups by Edmonton, and he took a penalty against McDavid along the boards to give the Oilers their lifeblood for two minutes. You can bet that DeBoer would prefer to avoid that matchup, but apparently the NHL has rules about who gets to make line changes and all that stuff. Sounds fishy to me, but I suppose now isn’t the time to file further litigation. It is notable that the two Stars penalties were taken by their third defense pairing, however. The Suter delay of game penalty was more of an unforced error, but still, that’s the closest thing to a weak link the Stars have, and Suter hasn’t even been that for most of the playoffs, to his credit. I’m sure it was nice for him and Petrovic that the Stars won’t remember either of those plays.
Jake Oettinger, for his part, looked good on the penalty kill, gloving down a Typical Leon Draisaitl one-timer to kill a dangerous setup. It was the only serious chance he had to stop, and Thomas Harley punctuated the penalty’s end by recording the Stars’ first shot on goal just before the first TV timeout of the game. It wasn’t an encouraging start, you might say. Also I am saying that, so you don’t have to. You probably did, though.
Things got more discouraging when McDavid was able to feather a puck between Oettinger’s skate at the post after a Mattias Ekholm wrap pass. Tyler Seguin, to his credit, had McDavid pretty well tied up, but again, fortune favored Edmonton, and the locked-up sticks perfectly navigated the puck back and forth and finally off the toe of Seguin’s stick and over the line like a bad game of air hockey to make it 2-0 Oilers.
Make that 100 career playoff points for Mr. McDavid pic.twitter.com/YCAkMBXrZO
— Sportsnet (@Sportsnet) May 28, 2024
Evgenii Dadonov got the Stars’ first chance of the game, when he lowered his shoulder and took the puck to Skinner off the rush, only to have Skinner’s glove just barely beat Sam Steel to the puck, winning the Battle of the Alliterative S’s. Logan Stankoven blocked an Evan Bouchard shot late in the first with his knee, and it sent him down the tunnel, but he returned for the second period, which is the best-case scenario for absorbing a blast from the Oilers’ best defenseman.
Edmonton was generally overwhelming the Stars by using high flips to traverse the neutral zone in the first period, and by running more kinetic overlap plays low in the offensive zone to open up back-door chances. It was clear that Edmonton’s game plan was to avoid trying to beat Oettinger with mere shots, and to instead outnumber Dallas down low, and they did so with a lot of success.
For their part, Dallas had a couple of other shots from distance, but they never managed to get to a rebound that could threaten Stuart Skinner, and the Oilers took a 2-0 lead into an intermission that the Stars desperately needed. Edmonton had something like 80% of the scoring chances in the opening frame, whereas Dallas looked unusually uncomfortable adapting to Edmonton’s new gameplan. As you’ve probably heard, Dallas did some adapting of their own after the break, though.
***
The second period started with a whole lot of promises that Dallas would later keep, with the Stars hemming Edmonton in their own zone for three successive shifts and six shots, but they neither earned a power play nor forced Skinner to do anything exceptional, unless you count Mason Marchment shooting a puck directly into the seat of Darnell Nurse’s pants exceptional. (I do not.) The lack of anything to show for the pressure left Dallas to either build on the great work or to consider it a wasted opportunity.
Jason Roberton quickly resolved that dispute when Roope Hintz just barely kept an attempted clearance in the offensive zone, eventually setting up Robertson for a lethal one-timer that he ripped over Skinner’s shoulder from some distance to get Dallas officially back in the game. Did anyone say something about Jason Robertson lately, by the way? I’m trying to remember.
Jason Robertson rips it past Skinner to get the Stars on the board! pic.twitter.com/xS4ISqlDnb
— Sportsnet (@Sportsnet) May 28, 2024
Hockey is a game of momentum, at least from shift to shift. It’s also a game of confidence, from player to player. And as the Stars leapt out to a 7-0 lead in the second period in shots on goal, it was a comforting sign that the team had, once again, woken up in the second period. And no one set their alarm clock earlier than Jason Robertson.
This time, it was Robertson’s turn to make a great keep at the blue line, as he deftly navigated the top of the zone while Seguin and Hintz battled at the netfront. And wouldn’t you know it, the puck popped out on edge to Robertson, who whipped a backhand over Skinner’s right shoulder (again) to tie up the game with his second goal in almost as many minutes.
ROBO GETS HIS SECOND OF THE PERIOD TO TIE THE GAME!
: Sportsnet
: Stream on Sportsnet+ pic.twitter.com/FRmOQm6GEG— Sportsnet (@Sportsnet) May 28, 2024
Momentum, were we saying? Ah yes, so then Wyatt Johnston continued the party after Jamie Benn embarrassed Desharnais on a clearing attempt that ended with the Oilers’ defenseman somersaulting backwards into his own crease as Johnston deposited a plump rebound.
Wyatt Johnston gives the Stars the lead with Dallas' third-straight goal! pic.twitter.com/iPHP64y7Y8
— Sportsnet (@Sportsnet) May 28, 2024
Mason Marchment then got a breakaway after Esa Lindell stepped up smartly to fire a home-run pass after a weak zone entry attempt by Ryan Nugent-Hopkins. But Marchment apparently drank a different flavor of Gatorade than Jason Robertson and Wyatt Johnston, so his backhand attempt rolled on him and went well high of the net to let Edmonton off the hook and avoid a 4-2 deficit.
Connor McDavid would finally record Edmonton’s first shot on goal of the second period with, according to TNT and my memory, 7:11 remaining in the second period. You have to hand it to the Oilers: they saw what Dallas did in the first period, and they outdid them by a country mile. (You absolutely do not have to hand it to them, no matter what Kris Knoblauch says.)
Unfortunately, Ryan Suter made a rough play under very little pressure, attempting a high flip with the lone Edmonton forechecker already peeling away. As you might expect, given the fact that I am talking about it here, the high flip flipped too high, going well out of play and handing Edmonton a chance to reverse course in a disastrous period. (Didn’t I say not to hand things to them?)
This time, Oettinger had more work to do on the penalty kill, with his biggest save coming off a McDavid shot from a behind-the-net feed that most goaltenders never would have tracked. Oettinger had to reach back with his blocker through netfront traffic, almost blindly, and it ended up being the fat part of his goal stick that made the save on a savvy shot by number 97. So the Stars would kill yet another Oilers power play, which you can bet will be a big story on Tuesday in Edmonton.
In the final minute of the period, Edmonton for the second game in a row got a goal from their depth in a losing effort. Jake Oettinger made a buddy pass to Thomas Harley, who couldn’t unload the pass cleanly, and that led to a quick pass into the netfront that Oettinger didn’t play well at all, leaving his near post to allow a lot of space that Adam Henrique found with a tip to tie the game. Oettinger would definitely want both the pass and the save attempt back, but time travel remains only available to my unc–REDACTED–I mean Not Invented Yet, so what are you gonna do?
WELCOME BACK TO THE LINEUP ADAM HENRIQUE! pic.twitter.com/8uwKy6F0PQ
— Sportsnet (@Sportsnet) May 28, 2024
With power plays sitting 2-0 in Edmonton’s favor, you would’ve expected Zach Hyman’s cross check in Marchment’s back to be an easy call for Dallas’s first opportunity. But that presumes you are not Steve Kozari, who has likely been embarrassed by one of Marchment’s dives in the past, and decided to make a point of tacking on an embellishment call to even things up. It was a call I was kind of…maybe not “okay with”, but at least understanding of? Marchment has been fined for diving by the league before, and he had shoulder checked right before the hit, and seemed to delay turning around just a tick longer than I’d expect, leading Kozari possibly to believe that he went a bit limp to accentuate the contact. Take that for what it’s worth, I suppose, but I can understand the call, even if I don’t love it.
Do you agree with Mason Marchment being penalized for embellishment on this Zach Hyman cross-check? pic.twitter.com/jj0DHL7Gjs
— Gino Hard (@GinoHard_) May 28, 2024
It all looked to set up a great third period between two teams who had each dominated a period. I’m sure a neutral party would’ve been having a ball.
***
The 4-on-4 to start the third period saw two chances for Edmonton, one on a backhand move by Draisaitl that Oettinger saved, and another by Thomas Harley on an attempt to bring it behind his net that Oettinger barely prevented from turning into a debacle after it slipped off Harley’s stick and on net. It otherwise wasn’t as life-threatening as the 4-on-4s against Colorado had seemed, which was a surprise, to me. You’d expect Edmonton to be dynamite with more ice, but their top guys just couldn’t get going, which is a testament to Dallas’s guys—including Jason Robertson, who plays well at 4-on-4, despite not being the fastest skater. He is a very complex and highly skilled player, you know.
Dallas successfully lowered the temperature for the next seven minutes or so, which is exactly what you want to do against this team. But the period got crazy around the midpoint, when a Vincent Desharnais shot off a drop pass hit the post behind a screened Oettinger. The puck then got sent immediately north, where Dadonov looked to have a breakaway, only for his footwork and the ice to get into a heated argument, and the chance fizzled away during pretrial negotiations.
Matt Duchene would get the next great chance, getting behind the defense to make a strong forehand move on goal that Skinner’s skate just barely caught up to, foiling the chance in order to keep things tied. Oettinger was his equal at the other end, as a McDavid shot from the high slot was repelled with equal authority, which was emblematic of Oettinger’s night. He was largely solid, aside from the weird Henrique goal. Sometimes a mistake’s purpose is to keep you humble on your way to victory, I suppose.
Jason Robertson completed his disassembly of Stuart Skinner with perhaps the most savage move of all when he completed his hat trick. Robertson took what looked to be a scary moment when a Lindell shot attempt snapped his own stick, all for the puck to trickle down low and find Robertson, eventually. The big forward watched Nurse go down to block the pass, then he watched Skinner reach his blocker hand out because the goalie was trying to [404 ERROR: FILE NOT FOUND]. Robertson summarily jammed the puck through the open spot behind Skinner’s extended arm, and into the net for a hat trick. It was cruel and unusual, but that doesn’t mean it wasn’t special, because it was Extremely Special Indeed.
ROBERTSON TUCKS IT FOR THE HAT TRICK!
The @DallasStars have the lead late in the third period! #StanleyCup
: @NHL_On_TNT (truTV) & @SportsonMax https://t.co/W9mpYG1lMO
: @Sportsnet or stream on Sportsnet+ https://t.co/sEijvXhbA1 pic.twitter.com/lBNhF1GIsY— NHL (@NHL) May 28, 2024
After some extended pressure by Edmonton, Dallas would finally get its first power play of the game when Wyatt Johnston made a sharp play with the less than eponymous Nurse caught betwixt and between. Johnston collected the puck just underneath the blue line and rather than trying to flip it out and change, he banked it off the boards and jumped around Nurse, who had little choice but to take the man, and an interference penalty to boot.
The power play was cautious, as you’d expect, with Dallas clearly more interested in keeping three men high than executing a killer seam pass, and you can’t really blame them for it. DeBoer even called a timeout halfway through just to make sure everyone was on the same page (I presume). Nothing came of it for either team, and Edmonton would send a puck down on Oettinger for a faceoff with 2:36 left, after which they decided to pull their goalie. And this time, they made the savvy decision to inform the whole team of the move.
Despite the team’s increased awareness of its empty net, Joe Pavelski very nearly scored right off a Stars faceoff win, missing a goal by about ten inches on a long shot. After Oettinger made a rebound save on Zach Hyman on the subsequent faceoff sequence, the Stars would have another defensive zone faceoff to deal with, and Miro Heiskanen would not miss his own 190-foot shot, giving the Stars a crucial insurance goal.
Edmonton finished the game in shocked silence and meek affect, and you wonder if this won’t end up being the game that they look back on as the last moment they had to grab this series. It’s early days yet, but as I once heard from Yogi Berra, it gets late early around here. Maybe that’s cause they’re so far north? I don’t know how the sun works. Nobody does, really. Maybe you’ll be the first one to find out, actually! Wouldn’t that be cool? One thing I do know, though, is that the sun is a star. I think that’s pretty cool.