Game 31 AfterThoughts: Toronto Games Shouldn’t Count
I am sure that you can find Dallas’s actual head-to-head record against the Toronto Maple Leafs over the past decade or so. I am equally sure that I don’t need to see it, because I believe the Stars must be something like 0-15-5 in their last 18 games against the Leafs. You’ll notice the math doesn’t add up there, and that’s because I am certain the Stars have found a way to lose two extra games just out of pure misery. That’s what this matchup feels like.
(Personally, I think it’s high time we just turned the Toronto games into a little miniseries apart from the regular season, because these contests are always the Goofus to the Washington games’ Gallant. Get a little statue of a cowboy boot with a maple leaf and award it to the winning team each time. This is marketing gold, I’m telling you. If nothing else, it would at least lessen the agony of these games.)
Tonight, the agony took a special form: a power play so listless that Sam Steel was getting looks by the end of it, and bench so thin that Colin Blackwell was on the ice to score an extra-attacker goal when the game was very much still up for grabs. Mason Marchment played just one shift in the third period before leaving with an undisclosed issue, and DeBoer said the Stars will know more tomorrow, which means we won’t know more until morning skate on Friday, as the Stars are prudently taking an off day to shop for some bionic legs for Heiskanen.
Put another way: the Stars are fighting through so much right now that Brendan Smith played more minutes than Lian Bichsel and Alex Petrovic, despite making the sort of mistake 7th defensemen are prone to make against a team like the Maple Leafs. But the Stars couldn’t afford to bench or protect defensemen any more than they already were, as they had a defenseman play about 30 minutes in a regulation game for the second straight night. That’s what Thomas Harley’s absence (and the lack of other options for those serious minutes) does for a team beset by a nasty flu virus right now. (And to Smith’s credit, he had some better moments as this went along, so it’s not as though he cost his team the game.)
Both Matt Duchene and Sam Steel mentioned that the team is shorthanded and fighting through the flu right now. DeBoer has been clear that it’s been nasty, and the proof of that is probably that Nils Lundkvist has been dealing with it for the better part of a week now, while Harley has missed two straight games. This isn’t just a headache and fever bug, in other words. This is something putting people on their back. And for the record, it’s not just the players who have come down with the virus, either.
It would be almost easier to write off this game if the Stars had been outplayed and looked exhausted. But instead, they came out strong, leaping out to a massive advantage in shots on goal, only to have the Leafs score two goals in 16 seconds to take back a lead they would never give up.
There was a path back in this game, for Dallas. But it would have involved a goal from someone who wasn’t penciled in for the fourth line out of training camp, rather than the three goals they did get. I’ve always thought it must be rough on players like Blackwell or Steel when they score in a losing effort, rather than feeling like they were key contributors to a victory. But then, their contributions are always so much more comprehensive than just scoring, and also they all make a lot of money, so that also makes it slightly less heart-wrenching, I suppose.
Jake Oettinger, who has been the Stars’ best player this year, had a rough night. Nobody on that team is going to blame him for this one, given how he just led them to a really great win against the best team in hockey two nights ago while playing like eight straight games or whatever. It happens, and the hope is that the other great players on your team can pick him up, as the Stars almost did. But with their best player not able to plug the leaks this time, they needed just one power play goal, or one converted 2-on-1 from Heiskanen, or a breakaway finished by Hintz, or, or, or. Any of those, and they might have ended up getting something from this game.
Duchene put it this way afterwards: “It’s tough. We had some looks we didn’t score on, and they had some that they did. So it’s frustrating.” That’s about the size of it, yep.
It was frustrating, and that’s okay. Maybe you broke your remote control tonight when that Nylander goal went in, and that is also okay (though it’s also pretty silly, too). It’s a long season, and Dallas is just shy of where they were last year, when Oettinger and Heiskanen ended up missing some time before Scott Wedgewood and company then came in and kept the ship afloat long enough for the Stars to get healthy and go on a crazy run late in the season after getting Chris Tanev (which DeBoer pointed out at morning skate today). There are over 50 games left to play! The Stars were always going to lose some games, and when it comes to playing Toronto, they were always going to lose it in some cruel, farcical fashion. At least now we know how it happened. That counts as closure, I am deciding right now.
This year, and especially right now, the Stars’ job isn’t to look like the best team in the league every game. It can’t be, especially when half their blue line against Toronto was made up of players not in their ideal starting lineup on Opening Night. Heiskanen ran all of every power play, and again—he played 29:50 in a regulation game in December. That’s not normal, or ideal! Thomas Harley has become a crucial part of this blue line, and he was just starting to round into really good form, as we detailed last week or whenever it was.
This game was cruel, yes. But a game like this was always inevitable at some point, especially with Dallas as thin as they were. The upsides? Casey DeSmith came in and looked like he hadn’t missed a beat, holding Toronto scoreless in the third while he was in net. Lian Bichsel continued to look like an NHL player in his fourth game, and that’s a very positive sign for Dallas. Being forced to given Bichsel 15 minutes a night for a few games has been an unexpectedly beneficial thing, I think, for evaluative and developmental purposes.
Mavrik Bourque also got an entire game on the top line with Hintz and Robertson, and he even got a look on a couple of later power plays (though with Marchment missing time in the second and then nearly the whole third, that was likely a factor). The result wasn’t what he would have hoped, though. Bourque had one glorious look that he put into the goaltender, and he didn’t look entirely out of place, but Bourque also got crushed into the boards by Max Pacioretty, thankfully getting up looking none the worse for wear.
Overall, he…well, he worked hard. That’s not me saying that, but that’s what DeBoer said afterwards, entirely. “He worked hard.” I think that’s a perfectly fair assessment of a rookie forward who didn’t capitalize on his latest opportunity. This game was neither his fault, not his apotheosis.
Tonight was nobody’s fault, individually, but it counts as a loss collectively. That’s the harsh thing about team sports: you can have a good or bad game yourself, but it might not matter if the rest of the group isn’t where they also need to be.
Tonight, the Stars’ bottom six forwards were good. Heiskanen was great in his half-hour of ice, with only one goal going in while he was on the ice. Hey, here’s an idea: find another Heiskanen to play the other 30 minutes, and then you’ll win every game. Honestly, it’s time for science to start picking up some slack here and converting my ideas into the reality you fans deserve. I’m out here hustling for you all.
***
As for the game action itself, it was a cagey first five minutes until Sam Steel got a breakaway and made the most of it. After Oskar Bäck collected the puck at the blue line, it looked for all the world like time had run out for Steel to get fed and go, but he stuck with it, and kept his momentum up effectively enough to still maintain a gap ahead of the apparently gassed Auston Matthews. Steel cut in from the left circle and got Joseph Woll to drop his blocker hand to push across, only for Steel to then fire the puck over his lowered shoulder to put the Stars up 1-0.
It’s funny that Steel has spent a few games playing up on the third line, but as soon as he moved back down to the fourth line, he scored. Predictability in life is a bug, not a feature.
Brendan Smith then had a moment that did not instill extra confidence in the Stars’ third defense pairing (which had their 7th and 8th defensemen on it) when he fumbled the puck in the neutral zone and gave up a rush chance to Max Domi. Alex Petrovic tried his best to handle the odd-man chance, but he backed off a bit too much, giving space for Domi to fire it past Oettinger’s blocker, and the game was tied right back up.
Roope Hintz took a retaliation penalty when he gave Max Pacioretty a cross check after the hit on Bourque, But the Stars made several clears to get through it. It’s funny how a game with this much special teams actions was decided at 5v5, where the Stars were by far the better team, except for a few instances in which they decidedly were not the better team.
Conor Timmins took a delay of game penalty later in the first period on an odd play where is clear hit the camera above the boards on the penalty boxes. But the officials judged the puck would have continued out of play, and the Stars got their first power play of the game. But the power play wasn’t able to solve Woll, though it generated some decent looks. The most interesting moment of the power play was probably when Heiskanen’s stick broke on a shot, and he had to back off without a stick to defend a 2-on-1.5. But Heiskanen beautifully guided the puck carrier into the boards with a hip check to neutralize the chance, and the Stars would got back on the job shortly afterwards when Timmins took a slashing penalty to go right back to the sin bin.
The second power play also finished fruitlessly, and the Stars entered the dressing room after 20 minutes with a 1-1 score despite a 15-4 edge in shots on goal that may, if possible, have underplayed how dominant the Stars ended up being though 20 minutes. To wit:
Evgenii Dadonov decided to correct for that imbalance right away, scoring a goal with a nice shoulder-shimmy to freeze Woll before firing one in over his shoulder into the near post. It was a pretty individual play for Dadonov’s 8th goal of the year.
In officiating news, Mason Marchment is still on the naughty list of the referees, as even Conor Timmins couldn’t get another penalty when he gave Marhcment a shot to the back while both were waiting for a high flip to come back down. Marchment went down, and Stankoven laid a hit on Timmins afterward, but nothing was handed out, and we played on.
Roope Hintz got a breakaway after a nice bit of stick jujitsu on Chris Tanev, the last man back. But he wasn’t able to tuck it five-hole, and the Leafs would quickly turn the game back around on a shotm by William Nylander. The first came on a 2-on-2-turned-breakaway of his own after Matthews drew both defenders to him and fed the open Nylander on his way in. Nylander ripped it high glove on Oettinger, and the game was tied. But not for long.
Nick Robertson decided to continue tormenting the Stars when he picked up a loose puck in the high slot and turned to let loose a fadeaway wrister that found its way through Oettinger. It was a goal you didn’t love to see go in (not that any of you love to see any goals go in on the Stars), and it made the game 3-2 Toronto despite just six shots on goal by the Leafs. Even hockey fans can calculate a .500 save percentages, so I won’t belabor the point. Sometimes your goalie has an off night, you know. It’s allowed, especially on your birthday. That’s my vote, at least.
Overall, Toronto went from looking listless and opportunistic to energized and chaos-causing, leading to multiple chances after the third goal, including a great save by Oettinger on Matthews with the right pad. But the Stars got a third power play after Simon Benoit attempted to give Colin Blackwell the Heimlich maneuver (this is my best guess), and it felt like a crucial moment for Dallas to stop the bleeding. They would not get the goal they needed.
Mavrik Bourque got a turn on that power play for what may have been his first proper power play of the year (and I think it was because Marchment was back in the room for a moment), and the Stars had multiple good looks during his time out there. But because it was a game against the Leafs, the Stars didn’t score. But Bobby McMann did score on a wrister that Oettinger would also want back, and it began to feel like One Of Those Nights, with a 4-2 scoreline in the visitors’ favor despite Dallas’s only allowing nine shots on goal through over half the game.
And really, that seemed to suck a lot of wind out of the Stars’ sails. They had outplayed the Leafs for most of the game, but the Stars’ best players hadn’t capitalized on their looks, and Jake Oettinger was having a rare off-night in the worst sort of way. There’s something about the timing of goals when it comes to a team’s energy, I think. And the third and fourth Leafs’ goals were absolute backbreakers, coming when and how they did.
Anyway, the second period ended with the scoreboard getting broken by a Leafs clearance, which just feels like it deserves some sort of punishment. It would be a shame if the air somehow got let out of the the Toronto bus tires in retaliation, so hopefully someone does not go down there and do that, right now, very quickly.
In the final period, Casey DeSmith led the team out onto the ice in place of Oettinger. The change made sense, given that Oettinger didn’t look up to his usual standards, and with four goals already past him, hitting the REFRESH button made sense. DeSmith hadn’t played since beating Utah two weeks ago, and he looked good when he made a big save right away on Domi on his front porch. DeBoer said afterwards that he wanted to give Oettinger a rest, and that he wanted to give DeSmith some game action.
One might wonder why they didn’t do that by starting DeSmith to begin with, but my guess is they decided the Rangers would be a better matchup for DeSmith on Friday. We will see if they are right, although my gut says that putting a couple of cardboard boxes in the crease might be enough to beat the Rangers right now. Either way, I don’t like second-guessing that sort of decision any more than usual. I tend to want goalies rotating more frequently than NHL coaches do, and they probably know more than I do. Probably. (Definitely.)
(I think.)
Craig Berube immediately reminded the Stars of what that 2019 St. Louis series was like, as time and space started to shrink for Dallas in the third period. With a two-goal deficit, a comeback wasn’t out of the question, but the lack of an early goal in the period really drained the life out of the building. Mason Marchment also left once again after one shift early in the third, meaning the Stars were shorthanded on the bench once again.
As for Woll, he broke what was left of the Stars’ hearts when Colin Blackwell fed Heiskanen perfectly on a 2-on-1, only for Woll to make a beautiful lunging glove-hand save on Heiskanen’s shot, which got over the pad but not the glove itself. It was that moment midway through the third where it felt like the universe was just confirming that it was, indeed, going to go the way you knew it always was going to go.
Woll robs Heiskanen
Dallas got one final chance to get something out of their power play when John Tavares let a careless elbow catch Heiskanen up high. But the energy continued to leak out of the group, and DeBoer even put Steel out on the second power play group in an attempt to get something going. You’ll note I said “attempt” rather than “successful attempt,” there. Alas, the word of the third period continued to be “Listless,” and time continued ticking down.
Johnston moved back up to the top line late, and when they pulled DeSmith with just under four minutes left, Jamie Benn came over the boards as the extra attacker. That group immediately tested Woll three times, and he looked calm, composed, and everything you need your goalie to be when defending a lead. Dallas leaned on him hard for well over a minute, getting traffic and shots, but it would be Colin Blackwell, on a gorgeous pass from Evgenii Dadonov, who gave the Stars some brief life.
Dadonov got a feed from Heiskanen (who was in the process of playing his 30th minute of the game), and he immediately found Blackwell at the back post, freezing Woll entirely. Blackwell made a brilliant play to trap the puck with his skate, then dove to ensure he tapped home the puck before Woll could recover, and the Stars had life.
At least, they did for 20 seconds or so, until the Stars failed to properly install the puck on the ensuing faceoff, and William Nylander outraced Heiskanen (which is very understandable) to stash the empty-net goal for the 5-3 win.
The Stars will take tomorrow off before ending the homestand against New York. A win in that one feels pretty important, given the up-and-down results of the Stars’ longest homestand of the season. You remember how that Nashville loss felt, right? Well, imagine what losing to a team Chris Drury is actively disassembling would feel like. Or better yet, don’t. Go to bed. Christmas is almost here, and those sugar plums won’t dance in their own heads.