Game 46 AfterThoughts: Finding (and Making) a Way

Low-event but high stakes

SotG

I’ve been to a whole lot of games at Staples Center.

I’m not sure of the exact count, but I lived in the Los Angeles area for 12 years of my life, so I think my attendance record in this rink is probably in the neighborhood of 40 or 50 games. And even with all the development in the surrounding area that is L.A. Live!, it’s still fun to be back in this neighborhood, this part of downtown Los Angeles that reminds you of everything that makes this area what it is, for better or for worse.

I remember when there were a lot more parking lots and far fewer revenue streams around the rink. I remember seeing the 2-0 Dallas victory featuring the revelation that was a rookie named John Klingberg, as well as the third period debacle that need not be named. I remember the Mike Ribeiro shootout goal you see on highlight reels and the 7-2 stomping after the Brad Richards trade. I remember when watching Stars games in LA was a lopsided affair, a match between a team that had won a Cup within the last decade and a team that was still searching for the trophy even Wayne Gretzky hadn’t been able to bring them.

These days, it’s different. The crowds are cockier, the lights are brighter, and the vibe is a bit more prickly than it used to be. Winning two championships in three years will do that, even a full decade after the most recent one of those, when a weekday night against a Dallas team doesn’t quite pack the house the way it ought to.

(Aside: I still contend that the LA/Anaheim rivalry is one of the best ones there is, if you ever get the chance to experience it in person. There are few arenas that feel quite as hopeless for visiting fans as an angry, packed Staples Center. And when that anger comes from teams in neighboring but very different California counties, it’s thrilling to experience.)

As for this game, in 2026, the Los Angeles Kings partially filled the building with everything Jim Hiller has coached them to bring, even if the crowd had a fair bit of Victory Green spread throughout the lower bowl.

Dallas was dumping in plenty of pucks out of raw necessity, with LA persistently clogging the neutral zone. On the other end, there were a lot of instances where Los Angeles fired pucks into traffic at the net from distance that Oettinger had to find. But find them he did on all but one occasion, and Gulutzan praised Oettinger afterward for doing what a big, positional goalie needs to do in tight games.

“I thought he was really good,” Gulutzan said. “It’s just one of those things behind the bench. You see that guy, how big he is, and finding pucks through traffic. I thought he was fighting through, and that’s what this game is.”

When he’s at his best, Oettinger does what he did tonight, kicking pucks away even with traffic in front, and foiling the best of the rebound chances before they could happen. I often think that Oettinger feeds off making some big saves early, and his keeping Dallas in front during a strong push by Los Angeles to open the second period was perhaps the most crucial portion of the game, both for the goals it prevented and the confidence it created.

That goal-prevention was even more crucial in retrospect, as the Stars got zero power plays in this one. And for the first time all year that I can remember, Glen Gulutzan voiced a bit of consternation about the lack of calls going the Stars’ way (albeit in a pretty low-key tone).

“I thought our guys battled through. They had a couple power plays. We didn’t get any calls tonight,” Gulutzan said. “I think we’ve got one of the quietest coaching staffs in the league, so I’m starting to question if maybe I need to yell a little bit more. Because every night it seems to be a little lopsided, and we’re a pretty quiet bench. So maybe that’s something I gotta add to my coaching list.”

As Michael Dixon pointed out after the game, the Stars’ penalty-minute differential has ebbed and flowed this year.

Right now, the Stars have a -14 penalty differential, which is in the bottom-third of the NHL. (Colorado and Minnesota, it should be added, sport the two best penalty-differentials in the league.)

There have been some folks talking lately about the penalty differential getting worse after the Mikko Rantanen fine for embellishment earlier in the season, and I can’t imagine that’s a total non-factor. Players like Rantanen (or Marchment before him) do tend to suffer from their reputation, and that leads to power plays being effectively rescinded, as we saw tonight.

And sure, it’s also the case that Dallas doesn’t play the way Colorado does, with furious speed and hyper aggression. They don’t force the issue in quite the same way, even if they are still quite capable of dictating their will, and so you would reasonably expect them not to draw quite as many.

But still, you'd also expect to draw at least one power play in a game like this, when Dallas was defending a lead for much of the contest. So for Gulutzan to choose (and it seemed very much a calculated choice) to voice some concern about the Stars’ lack of power plays is no small thing. Looking at the numbers, however, it’s little wonder he’s a bit less than thrilled with recent numbers.

Dallas hasn’t gotten more power plays than an opponent since 12/27 against Chicago. Over the subsequent seven games, power play opportunities have been 26 to 13 in favor of the Stars’ opponents.

In other words, the Stars have had to kill twice as many penalties as they’ve drawn. That’s an extremely difficult ask, and it makes the fact that Dallas has gotten even the relatively meager 6 points out of those 7 games that they have seem a bit more impressive.

This game as a whole falls into that impressive category, too. Not only did Dallas win a game despite losing the special teams battle, and not only did they do so after having an apparent go-ahead goal called back; they also won said game despite missing an empty net, sliding a puck across the goalmouth of another empty net, and never getting a single power play to begin with.

Coupled with returns to action for Jamie Benn and Jake Oettinger after absences for very different reasons, this game could have been a tense, uneven one. Instead, Dallas found a way to claw ahead and hold the door closed enough to keep the monsters of doubt from opening it back up.

There is no such thing as a bad win, but when you’ve lost seven of the last eight games, there is really no such thing as a bad win.

How fitting, perhaps, that Matt Duchene scored the empty-netter to seal things. He has had as uneven a season as anyone, given his concussion symptoms and lack of familiar linemates. But in the end, he got the job done, and the process is ultimately judged by the end result.

In this game, Dallas yet again showed themselves capable of getting those results. And that is really what it’s all about. Until the next game, at least.

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Thomas Harley created a scoring chance on his first shift of the game by circling around Corey Perry and behind the LA net. It was a positive sign for one of the most important players on the team, and this game would have more of them to come.

Specifically, an even more positive sign, which was a goal by Wyatt Johnston. Esa Lindell and Sam Steel jumped up to create a 3-on-2 rush that Kempe and friends looked like they could have sorted out into a 3-on-3, but both Brian Dumoulin and Brandt Clarke gravitated towards Lindell as he drove to the net, and that created plenty of space for Johnston to slide into the slot, where Steel found him.

That isn’t a chance any team wants to give a player like Johnston, and he showed why with a snap shot against the grain on Kuemper to stake Dallas to a 1-0 lead just a few minutes into the contest.

Alex Laferriere and Mikko Rantanen exchanged one-minute penalties in the corner seven minutes into the period, but neither was called. That seems like a good bit of officiating, in my opinion.

The Stars then leaned on the Kings for a minute-long shift in the offensive zone by (you guessed it) the Hintz line, overlapping and handing off the puck as LA began to tire. But irony of ironies, the big Robertson one-timer from the slot that the whole rush generated would end in the shot thunking painfully into Roope Hintz. Life isn’t fair.

Jake Oettinger said this morning that while you’d prefer to have a few long-distance marshmallows (paraphrasing) to warm up on, that’s not something you can reasonably expect in the NHL. But after the first period, it turned out he had gotten pretty much that in terms of workload, after which the Stars held a 1-0 lead.

HockeyViz - First Period Shots

The second period wouldn’t start so kindly, as Oettinger faced a wicked Kempe shot right off the rush from the opening faceoff, and then had Corey Perry slide a puck behind him and alone the goal line, but out the other side. Alex Turcotte also tested him with traffic in front, but Oettinger was able to withstand the early flurry.

It wasn’t hard to guess the content of the Kings’ intermission speech: More pucks on net, and faster transition play. Both of those were present in spades, and the shots on goal ramped up to 7-1 for Los Angeles in the middle frame before a Warren Foegele half-breakaway required yet another important save from the Stars’ netminder.

The first penalty of the game was bound to be a big one, but the Stars managed to absorb the big Kings’ push without going shorthanded. At the halfway point of the game, Drew Doughty then got nailed for interference on Rantanen, but Rantanen was assessed two minutes of his own for embellishing the contact, going off his skates after the bump while reaching for Doughty’s stick.

A lot of players don’t get that embellishment call, though I can see the merits of calling it, in all honesty. But Rantanen is filling Marchment’s shoes in at least one or two ways this year, and so we saw 4-on-4 action.

Rantanen nearly scored righty after exiting the box, but Kuemper made a nice stick-side save off a Determined Rantanen Rush [patent pending], and we got back to five-a-side hockey, which is to say the low-event nature of the first period returned, and the Stars took the 1-0 lead into the second period, with shots on goal at 18-9 for Los Angeles.

Jamie Benn took a tripping penalty at the Stars’ blue line to give LA the first power play of the night, but a great Jake Oettinger stick foiled a potentially deadly pass through the crease that ended up being the best chance LA got, as Dallas stepped up with a crucial kill.

But they’d have to do it all over again when Nils Lundkvist took a tripping penalty of his own at the side of the net, giving LA a second chance in three minutes to capitalize up a man. And this time, they would do so, as Quinton Byfield got a pass from Corey Perry (on his 500th career assist) on what was essentially a 2-on-0 in front of the net, as Heiskanen stretched out to try to kick a deflected puck away only to see it find its way to Corey Perry, who instantly sent a blind pass to the other post. It was as forgivable a goal as any goalie can allow.

Fittingly, we found ourselves with a 1-1 game and 10 minutes to play. It was the low-event third act this game deserved, but a dangerous backhand chance by the Johnston/Rantanen line nearly restored the Stars’ lead. Darcy Kuemper has to earn his paycheck somehow, I suppose.

The fourth line (with Rantanen double-shifting) then had a gilt-edged chance to do the same, when Kuemper got pulled out of the net and saw multiple pucks somehow elude the space between the vacant posts in almost a mirror image of the Kings’ chance through the crease earlier in the game. I suppose the force fields also have to earn their paycheck.

But the Stars’ counter-push finally did break through, as two failed clearances by LA led to a deflected puck sliding right to Rantanen, who clapped it home. But the play was pretty clearly offside to begin with, thanks to a nice poke check at the blue line by LA, and the 1-1 score stubbornly refused to budge.

That’s where Jason Robertson came in and put a goal-scorer’s goal past Kuemper. Well, sort of.

“I just got the middle ice and saw drivers going to the net,” Robertson said. “So, throw it on the net.”

Indeed he did that. Gaining the middle of the ice to begin with was key after a nice exchange with Hintz in the neutral zone, and then Robertson was smart enough to know that even a soft backhand in that situation wasn’t a zero-percent shot. Not even close to that, in fact.

In the final minutes, the Stars managed to hold a one-goal lead much more solidly than either of their two-goal leads in San Jose. And that was in spite of their squandering a couple of chances to seal the game with the Kings’ net empty, as pucks on the sticks of Rantanen (who surprisingly deferred, only to see the chance fizzled) and Steel (who hit the post) failed to find the mark.

But with 25 seconds to go, Matt Duchene would get a nice Rantanen up and carry it to the neutral zone, where he finally did what needed to be done, and put the game to bed with a 3-1 victory.

Lineups

Dallas rolled these lines:

Steel-Johnston-Rantanen
Robertson-Hintz-Bourque
Hryckowian-Duchene-Benn
Bäck-Faksa-Bastian

Lindell-Heiskanen
Harley-Petrovic
Capobianco-Lundkvist

Oettinger in goal

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Los Angeles did this:

Malott – Laferriere – Kempe
Foegele – Byfield – Perry
Fiala – Turcotte – Kuzmenko
Lee – Helenius – Ward

Anderson – Doughty
Edmundson – Clarke
Dumoulin – Ceci

Kuemper

After-AfterThoughts

• Not entirely germane to this game, but: I was recently reminded that former Dodgers GM Ned Colletti is now a scout for the San Jose Sharks. It doesn’t make sense to me, but then, I suppose it doesn’t have to.

• There was a really noticeable "STARS" shout from the lower bowl during the national anthem in Los Angeles. I choose to believe that all the visiting Stars fans became best friends with each other during this game.

• I had a moment this morning to chat with Radek Faksa about his old Texas Stars teammate Matěj Stránský, who will be joining Faksa on Team Czechia next month in Milan at the Winter Olympics. More on that later this week, but it’s a cool connection.

• Visor or no, rest assured that Jamie Benn is still eschewing a helmet during warmups:

  

  Matt Duchene is the only other Stars player to go sans-bucket during warmups these days, without Tyler Seguin or Mason Marchment around.

• Glen Gulutzan talked this morning about the need for every player to “clean up their own backyard” in terms of avoiding unnecessary penalties. He talked about how a lot of the issues aren’t because of excessively violent play, but more related to “overtry.”

  • I think there’s a lot of truth to that. When you feel like you’re dictating the game, it’s easy enough to be patient, to trust that someone else can help out rather than diving or reaching to recover. But when you start feeling desperate, your decision-making process deteriorates. (This is also good dating advice, FYI.)

• A couple of interesting forward pairings showed up during the 4-on-4 set midgame: Duchene with Steel, and Hryckowian with Johnston. The latter duo came at the end of the 4v4, which led to Hryckowian-Johnston-Rantanen for a bit. I’m sure Online Fans will react rationally to seeing this trio.

• The third line of Benn, Duchene, and Hryckowian features players who have all suffered painful hits of some kind to the head or face this year. Is this the Pumpkin Line? The Dome Zone? I’m now accepting submissions (and will steal the credit for any good ones).

• With Lyubushkin taking a healthy scratch tonight, I can’t help but wonder if we could see Nils Lundkvist enter a similarly precarious zone before too much longer. His penalty tonight led to the tying goal, and he hasn’t quite taken the step I think the organization has been hoping to see from him this year. He’s a good player, absolutely. But if he’s not playing a regular role in the top four, I don’t see him as being the most desirable third-pairing option in the intensity of a playoff battle. That’s a tough reality to face, but time finally appears to be running a bit short.

  • Then again, with this defense, I won’t count out anyone from winning that final top-four spot until they actually win it. It really does remain an unfortunately open question who Thomas Harley’s partner will be in Game 1 of the playoffs, even 46 games in.

• And finally, a collection of Jamie Benn quotes to finish with:

  • Jamie Benn on the game tonight: “I think that’s exactly what we needed. A game that is not pretty at all. It’s a grind right to the end, and your goalie’s the best player, and you find a way to win.”

  • Jamie Benn on what his healing process was like: “Pretty much just took a couple days off. Quick surgery. A couple skates in there. Not a big deal.”

  • Jamie Benn on whether he’ll keep wearing a visor after this game: “I think that’s probably it for me. Back to normal tomorrow.”

  • Jamie Benn on how his family felt about him wearing a visor: “I haven’t talked to my mom, but I know she loved it. And definitely my wife.”