Game 4 AfterThoughts: Trouble Brewing and Boiled Over

3-1-0

“You know what, this has been brewing,” Glen Gulutzan said after the game. “If you want to take an objective view of our record, three and one is probably where it should stand.”

Indeed, the Stars have scored 18 goals in four games, but they’ve also surrendered 15 in that same time. And unless the NHL has morphed into a 5-4 league overnight, one of those numbers is going to have to come down for a team with championship aspirations.

For Gulutzan, the problem is less about systems than it is about decision-making and mentality—particularly when the Stars are leading.

“The problem we’re getting into isn’t so much structure or anything like that,” Gulutzan said. “It’s just managing the game. We need to manage leads.”

The Stars’ head coach pointed to a couple of plays where the Stars were being more aggressive when the right play was probably to be a bit simpler, and Thomas Harley was involved with two of them—though he was far from the only culprit.

Harley didn’t spare himself from any criticism, though.

“You look at their first goal, that’s on me,” Harley said. “That’s an easy fix. Their third goal, again is on me, that’s an easy fix. The fourth one’s just kind of a bad play in the middle that gets picked off. We can eliminate that.”

Harley went on to point out that the Stars should be prepared for the fact that a trailing team, as Vancouver was early in the second period, is going to push hard and take chances in order to get looks they wouldn’t usually get. That means Dallas has to be smarter with their choices, even if it means being less aggressive offensively.

Gulutzan said it wasn’t fair to put all the blame on Harley for those two goals, couching it more as a “stacking set of errors” that led to the two goals off the rush for the Canucks.

“It’s my job to make sure that we’re managing those situations and making guys aware of where we are,” Gulutzan said. “Not sitting back and playing your game, but being comfortable playing the way we did in the first period.”

Gulutzan also made sure to point out that he wants his team to play a more “simple” game when they’re protecting a lead—and he made sure to add that “simple” is not the same as “conservative.”

“You don’t need to pile on and make it five-nothing or 7-1, four-nothing right away,” Gulutzan said. “You can chip away. Usually what happens, if you stay with kind of a simplistic game after you’ve established a lead, they take risks. And that’s when you can come at them. But we’re taking some unnecessary risks, in my mind, with leads.”

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It’s hard not to thnk about the last time the Canucks were in this building, when Pete DeBoer’s Stars had one of the worst meltdowns in recent memory.

But despite two new head coaches behind the benches, the Stars decided to once again let the Canucks go on a run after building a lead, surrending four straight goals in the second period to turn a 2-0 game into a 4-2 deficit with a disatrous run of second period defensive breakdowns.

First, Thomas Harley tried what he called an “all-or-nothing” play on a bouncing puck, only to miss the puck entirely and surrender a breakaway to Filip Chytil. But in fairness, the Stars’ positioning just after the end of a power play was already disastrous, with Harley facing a potential 2-on-1 (which I believe led to him trying a more desperate play to begin with). And this situation just can’t happen, up 2-0, coming off a power play.

If the power play unit had handled the final seconds a bit more simply, Harley wouldn’t have been back all alone to begin with. That’s probably a bigger culprit than his choice to swipe at the puck there, or at least an equal one.

The second Canucks goal came after Radek Faksa got tagged for hooking Evander Kane (who drew multiple penalties tonight). Quinn Hughes then did what he does, finding Brock Boeser on the power play for a deflection to tie the game up barely two minutes after the Stars had a 2-0 lead.

The third Canucks goal came just a minute after that, when Nils Lundkvist stepped up and threw a puck across the ice. And despite the Stars appearing to have numbers back, the play sucked a couple of players out of position, leaving Max Sasson all alone to receive a bank pass down the right wall as Harley hadn’t yet recovered to the other side, and Erne was skating toward the puck, leaving Sasson a wide open path to the net that he happily took.

Here, the better play for Lundkvist is probably to simply send the puck in on the strong side right away, rather than going for a cross-ice feed. I think Harley jumps up here anticipating that Lundkvist’s pass is going to create a rush chance he can join, but the failed connection means he has to get back in a hurry, and he doesn’t.

So, you can see what Gulutzan is talking about on those two goals. Complicated solutions to simple problems saw them lose a lead in far too short a time. But of course, the eventual game-winning goal was the dagger.

Colin Blackwell had his second tough game in a row, and his giveaway to Noted Stars Killer, Conor “Villain with a White Turtleneck” Garland was a real dagger, especially coming with a minute left in the second period. Instead of the Stars getting to the break needing to reset and just push for one goal (which they eventually got), they walked off the ice with the vibes feeling lousy and needing two (which they didn’t get).

My hunch—and it’s only that—is that Adam Erne could stay in the lineup if Duchene is able to return on Saturday.

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If there’s any consolation about this game, it’s how close the Stars still did come to recovering from the blown lead. Because the third period featured multiple chances for them to get back into it, including a power play early in the third period. But Thatcher Demko came up huge with a big stop on Roope Hintz (who will feel he left a little on the table in this one), and Sam Steel had a similarly golden chance get blocked at the last minute. Either of those changes the shape of the game with plenty of time left.

Instead, the clock seemed to move a bit more quickly. Hintz had one more great chance late, a beautiful look in front off a Bourque setup, only to miss the net wide. So although Rantanen drew a penalty with 2:35 left that led to Seguin setting up Johnston for a 6-on-4 goal, the Stars didn’t quite have enough time for their fearsome offense (and it is that) to erase the deficit.

As Seguin said the message was during the second intermission: “Don’t give up four.” Good advice, as it turns out, because giving up four makes it pretty tough to win.

As for Casey DeSmith, he did his part and then some, you’d say, with two frantic saves on Connor Garland after the score got to 3-2 for what felt at the time like a “remember that save” moment (or moments). The first was an attempt by Garland to bank it off DeSmith at the near post as he went behind the net, and the second came on a wrap-around by Garland, who looked like he was banking on DeSmith’s staying at the near post a bit longer after being scared (or scarred) by the first chance.

It reminded me a bit of how a pitcher will “set up” an outside fastball by coming inside one pitch before, pushing a player a bit off the plate. But this ain’t baseball, and DeSmith’s acrobatics were enough to hold the game at 3-2.

DeSmith really was on his game early, even when shots on goal mounted to 8-1 for Dallas early in the first period. He saved their bacon after Miro Heiskanen got caught pinching at exactly the wrong time, leaving Jake DeBrusk room to rush down the ice with Esa Lindell trying to take away the middle of the ice. DeSmith stopped the first shot, and then somehow got recollected enough to shut down Boeser when the latter found a plump rebound right on the doorstep that looked like a goal, only to not be. Life is like that sometimes.

DeSmith had a milder version of Jake Oettinger’s game against Colorado, where a four-goal night wasn’t necessarily a bad goaltending performance. But this time, Dallas couldn’t find their own fourth goal in regulation, and that’s what mattered most.

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Mavrik Bourque said this morning that he felt like the Minnesota game was his best one so far this season, even though he got a great scoring chance that didn’t go in. They say luck tends to even out, and he did score on a fluke play in this one when Elias Petterssen (yes, that one) tipped a Bourque pass into the Canucks’ net for the forward’s first goal of the year. They do not ask how, I’m told, but at least now you know how, in case they ever do.

Bourque, for whatever it’s worth, was fairly dismissive of the goal afterward. Yes, it’s nice to score, but on a night with regrets like this one, a lucky goal understandably isn’t much consolation.

The other early Stars tally came when Mikko Rantanen drew a power play by some exemplary work at the netfront, catching Jake DeBrusk’s stick in the side of the face to put Dallas on the power play. And Rantanen then proceeded to finish what he’d started, with this gorgeous shot off a pass from Jason Robertson to make it 2-0.

The good news is that having trouble managing leads means that you’re getting them to begin with. Dallas looks every bit like a team that’s going to be scoring buckets of goals this year. Now, they just need to stop tripping after filling said bucket, because breaking your crown and tumbling down is a real bummer of way to spend a Thursday night.

Esoteric Soundtrack of the Game (ESotG)

Lineups

With Duchene out for tonight, the Stars began with these lines:

Steel-Hintz-Rantanen
Robertson-Johnston-Seguin
Blackwell-Faksa-Bourque
Erne-Hryckowian-Bastian

Lindell-Heiskanen
Harley-Lundkvist
Bichsel-Petrovic

DeSmith in goal

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The Canucks rolled out this look, to start:

O’Connor-Pettersson-Garland
DeBrusk-Chytil-Boeser
Kane-Raty-Sherwood
Bains-Sasson-Karlsson

Hughes-Hronek
M.Pettersson-Myers
E.Pettersson-Mancini

Demko in goal

AfterThoughts

• A whole lot of folks were saying that the broadcast during the first period sounded slightly off, and when I listened to it for a minute or two, the ambient microphones did seem almost nonexistent. It reminded me a bit of how broadcasts sounded in 2020, when Josh and Razor were calling games off a monitor in Las Colinas while the action was happening in Edmonton. But in fairness, I haven’t gone back and watched the second half of the game, so let me know if it improved after the first.

• Adam Erne nearly scored a goal on his first shift, only for Demko’s blocker arm to flash up just in time. What was the year when it seemed like every new Stars player was scoring a goal in their first game? I want to say 2011, but that’s mainly because nobody wants to remember 2011 well enough to disprove me. So, I’ll stick with that. Anyway, good way to start a Stars career, for Erne. (A goal would have made it great, though.)

• The Robertson-Johnston-Seguin line is an interesting one, to me. It had a couple of tantalizing shifts early, and it just feels like Seguin could score heaps of goals if they had the runway to really try. But with Duchene likely back sooner rather than later, probably it will be a fun little short-term thing. For now.

• On the other hand, the Steel-Hintz-Rantanen line really had trouble getting anything going through 40 minutes, after which they were sporting a paltry 0.09 expected goals for (xGF), per Natural Stat Trick. That’s not first-line material.

• Early in the third, Gulutzan finally did load up his top line, putting Rantanen out on the right wing of Johnston and Robertson for a spell. They immediately generated a scoring chance (aided by Heiskanen and Harley being paired on the back end), but Harley took a (pretty borderline) hooking penalty on the next shift to sap the momentum. Tough one for Harley tonight, but he probably got a bit worse than he deserved, even if the team as a whole didn’t.

• I really liked this bit of work from Lian Bichsel, right up until the end where he iced it. Very deft work and good vision to get out of his own end with possession…nearly.

• DeSmith really was outstanding early on, but his best save might have been this one, where he just barely scraped the puck back away from the goal as it sat on the line.

• That came about two minutes before the Canucks got on the board, when Dallas didn’t quite sort things out as a power play ended, leading to an Evander Kane bounce pass to Filip Chytil that Harley couldn’t corral.

• Harley also got tagged with a minus after the Canucks struck quickly in transition, when Max Sasson got a nice feed from Tyler Myers at top speed, flying down a too-empty left wing and ripping a shot over Casey DeSmith to take the lead.

• After going up 2-0, it looked like the Stars were on track to get to Demko all night long. But he came up with a couple of huge stops as the game wore on, and his robbery on Hintz from the slot during an early third-period power play felt like a big statement from the big American goaltender.

• The Stars could have made it tougher on Demko, such as this gift for Hintz after Bourque fed a (probably too easy) backhand to him for a golden chance—only for Hintz to fire it well wide. I’m sure Hintz would agree that you need to at least force the goaltender to make a save on a chance like this.

• The game ended in about as silly a fashion as the second period did, when what looked like a pending icing call turned into a penalty on Heiskanen after Rantanen appeared to slow down, likely due to a miscommunication between tired players. It’s hard to be too worried about this sort of thing, given the state of the game at that point, but it does feel like a fitting way to finish a game as riddled with mistakes as this one was.
  
  We’ll see if a matchup against a defensively stout St. Louis team brings a different effort from Dallas on Saturday.