Game 60 AfterThoughts: Stars Set Franchise Record, Dominate Canucks, Score Lots of Goals

Vancouver scored the first goal, but Dallas scored the last six

Song of the Game

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When a team is playing as well as the Stars are right now, it’s almost unsurprising that they’re setting franchise records, as the Stars did tonight with their ninth victory in a row.

Conversely, when you’re having a miserable season, the misery tends to start bursting through cracks you didn’t even know existed.

Stars fans will remember well the 2016-17 season, when all the great vibes of the previous year’s campaign disappeared seemingly overnight. That season saw plenty of calamity, but the play that will always sum it up in my mind is Jiri Hudler’s drop pass into his own team’s empty net.

Disaster begets disaster, and the Canucks were a first-class example of that tonight.

After Vancouver went up 1-0, they were playing well. Exceptionally well, even, allowing for the fact that they had only won twice in their last 21 games. After all, these were the same Stars who had to go to overtime against Nashville just the other day. Could that 1-0 lead turn into something the Canucks could use to dig out of this funk?

Just when some of those downtrodden fans might have dared to even begin hoping something like that, the most 2025-26 Canucks moment of all happened: Adam Erne banked a shot off a skate, off the end boards, and off the goaltender into the net.

“I think it was just kind of a weird one,” Adam Erne said. “We had a 2-on-2 there, their guy kind of caught Ritzy, and I went to shoot it. Their D blocked it, and obviously got a bounce.”

The Stars “got a bounce” in the same way that Charlie Bucket “found a ticket,” and they never looked back from there. Goals poured in from all over the lineup en route to a 6-1 trouncing that easily could have been much worse for the home side.

“I thought we pretty much dominated most of that game,” Erne said. “They had a couple of shifts in the first early on where they kind of came back a little bit. I thought we came out really strong, but I thought that was as full a 60 minutes as we’ve played. Liked the effort all around.”

It’s a horrible place to be if you’re Vancouver, but the Stars won’t lose too much sleep over the wounded egos of their B.C. opponents. (And one would suspect that goes double for Tom Gaglardi.)

“That’s the best part, is we’ve got lots of guys chipping in,” Gulutzan said. “Big goal by Erns to get us kind of started, and then a power play goal. Blackie made a real nice play, and Bisch has got two. So every guy’s getting in there, and it’s good when your team, you know, every guy starts to feel good about themselves.”

For coaches, it has to be satisfying to see depth players get moments to shine. Whether it’s a forward like Colin Blackwell or Adam Erne (both of whom have played well after the break) or a third-pairing defenseman like Lian Bichsel, goals are nice moments of affirmation.

But outside of the goals, it’s important to recognize just how consistently the Stars have played over their last ten games or so.

“Yeah, I think the biggest thing with us right now is, even if you look back at the last few games,” Gulutzan said, “We’re just staying with our game for a long period of time. First period in Nashville was real tight. This [first period] was real tight. Other ones have been real tight, but we just kind of stay with it. Right now, we’re doing a good job of outlasting other teams. That’s what I like about it.”

If you had any doubts about how healthy Bichsel’s ankle is, this game probably put that to rest. He was mobile and smart, putting himself in good positions even before he finished two chances with top-quality shots. Giving him those extra three weeks to work his way back into shape is looking like a pretty brilliant decision right now.

Bichsel gave Lyubushkin and Bourque ample credit for the two setups, and both players did well. But seeing a hulking, behemoth defenseman hitting corners like Bichsel was tonight is basically every GM’s dream. And sometimes, dreams can come true.

As for the rest of the lineup, the Stars’ second period dominance (and third-period command) allowed them to spread out the minutes aggressively. Heiskanen and Lindell got some much-needed rest, playing “only” 20 minutes apiece, while Lundkvist and Harley took the top D-pairing spot in terms of ice time. With another game in Calgary on Tuesday, that kind of balance is a helpful thing when it comes to rest and recovery.

If you’re Gulutzan, you probably look for an opportunity to poke a hole in the team’s collective balloon before Tuesday night, but it’s going to be tough to do. The vibes are good, even with some key players still missing, and the Stars are quite literally winning more games than they’ve ever done before. Good luck going full “Herb Brooks before the Finland Game,” if that’s even possible. This team might have ended up making this game a laugher, but you can’t say they haven’t earned a win like this, given how they’ve been playing. Dominance also tends to beget domination.

When a shorthanded team is really rolling, coaches must dread the fact that they will inevitably have to change things up by putting healthy guys back into the lineup. Yes, you’d normally want to rotate a guy or two into the lineup in a back-to-back situation, but if Roope Hintz isn’t absolutely 100%, don’t you at least consider rolling this same group in Calgary again tomorrow (today)?

As for the defense: With all due respect to Alex Petrovic and Kyle Capobianco, it’s hard to see Lyubushkin coming out of the lineup after tonight. This obviously contradicts the old saw about how not changing a lineup just because you won is tantamount to admitting you don’t know why you won, but hey, this ain’t baseball.

Good teams are supposed to dominate bad teams, but as Carolina found out tonight in their loss to Seattle, that doesn’t always happen in hockey. Even the mighty Colorado had to squeak out a win against an LA team that looks almost on the precipice of a death spiral.

So for Dallas to finally show they can run roughshod over an inferior opponent is, as Gulutzan said, a testament to their persistence. This team has found a repeatable, winning formula, and it’s made them a joy to watch right now. And joy is the point of the thing, you know.

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The game began with the predictable amount of Dallas pressure, with Vancouver largely looking to counter with stretch plays to the far blue line. Generally speaking, the Stars had the puck, but they couldn’t turn it into anything exceptionally dangerous despite a couple of close calls.

Conversely, Vancouver made the most of their first Grade-A chance, as a Jake DeBrusk shot went off Oettinger, off both of Evander Kane’s skates, and into the net for the game’s first goal.

There are a lot of coverage issues here, not least of which is Kane’s coming down the weak side completely unmarked after Bourque and Johnston both looked elsewhere. But again, there are lots of players you could point to on this play who had room for improvement.

That goal gave Vancouver some jump that Dallas struggled to match for the next 10 minutes, and Jamie Benn made the hill slightly steeper by putting the Canucks on a power play shortly thereafter, when he gave Tom Willander the business in a way that ripped off Willander’s helmet, resulting in a roughing penalty. But Dallas got through it without further incident.

Speaking of incidents, Adam Erne tied the game after he took a shot off the rush that went off a defender, off the end boards, and then back off Nikita Tolopilo and into the net. If that sounds like the hockey equivalent of a run-on sentence, then it’s because it looked exactly like it:

Due credit to Colin Blackwell, whose hard work along the boards kept the puck free for Erne to poke along without slowing down. Less credit is due to the goaltender (or more, if you’re Dallas).

As if that goal wasn’t enough to scar Tolopilo, the Stars nearly banked a second one into the net off of him, albeit accidentally when a puck caught a corner off the boards on a later dump-in, sliding right back across the crease.

All told, both teams were probably pretty happy not to be trailing after 20 minutes, given the sort of period it had been. (But then, aren’t teams always happy not to be trailing?)

The Stars came out of the first intermission with authority, peppering Tolopilo with stressful shots aplenty. The Johnston line continued to generate chances almost ex nihilo, outwaiting Canucks coverage in order to generate better looks. Before five minutes had elapsed, Dallas had already matched their six shots on goal from the first period, while Vancouver had yet to test Oettinger.

Dallas finally would get rewarded for their pressure, and they collected in style, as Lian Bichsel and Ilya Lyubushkin combined for a pretty bit of activation and passing that Bichsel completed with a wicked shot to make it 2-1.

From there, it only got worse for Vancouver. Filip Hronek batted a puck out of play to unfortunately put his team on the penalty kill, and Jason Robertson and Matt Duchene combined for a pretty entry, setup, and finish to immediately punish the Canucks mistake. 3-1, Dallas.

That is, in short, how you take over a game.

Nils Höglander nearly scored his first goal of the season, and twice. First, he got a look when the Canucks got a fortunate bounce off a skate between the circles, setting him up for an open look from a great spot. He then got another gift of a chance when Nils Lundkvist fanned on a pass while backing up, turning it over for a one-timer feed to Höglander from the slot.

But Höglander’s total stayed at (ahem) nil after his first shot rang off the crossbar and went out of play (Bastian may or may not have gotten a tiny bit of a stick on the shot), and his second look was denied by Jake Oettinger’s left pad.

Thus, the Stars took a two-goal lead into the second intermission after largely dominating the worst team in hockey. The mischief, thus far, had been well-managed.

Speaking of management, Marcus Pettersson began the final period with a regrettable turnover that he clanked off Heiskanen’s skates well shy of the blue line. That led to a chance for Sam Steel, who went into his back of tricks to sell everyone on a shot before feeding it back to Duchene, who had the entire net to shoot at, and he didn’t miss.

You’ll note that I refrained from saying anything about Nathan MacKinnon there, and that’s because we at Stars Thoughts try to keep it classy.

Whatever the opposite of classy is, that’s what Vancouver did on the Stars’ fifth goal, but Colin Blackwell didn’t complain about the chance, and he finished it in style.

Mavrik Bourque nearly made it 6-1 on a 2-on-1 rush after another rough bit of puck management from Vancouver, but Tolopilo, to his credit, reached out with the pad and the glove to keep the Canucks within four.

Adam Foote probably would have thrown the towel in at that point, given the chance. The Canucks were playing with all the circumspection of a punch-drunk boxer in the ninth round, and the Stars were getting look after look as a result.

A couple of penalties led to some 4-on-4 action late in the game, and that led to perhaps the most emblematic moment of the game, when Nils Lundkvist got a breakaway from center ice on in.

No, he didn’t score. Yes, he had fun.

It’s not always about the goals.

The Canucks wanted to go home, and Dallas wanted to keep scoring goals, because goals are fun. That’s what Lian Bichsel thinks, anyhow, as we learned after he made it 6-1 with his second great shot of the night.

Arttu Hyry got a look in tight in the final minutes as well, and who could blame anyone for trying to score their first NHL goal in this game? No further damage would be done, however, as the Stars set a franchise-best nine-game winning streak while the Canucks got booed for the final 10 seconds of regulation. It’s been a long time since 2007.

Lineups

Dallas brought the same heat as usual, of late:

Robertson-Johnston-Bourque
Steel-Duchene-Benn
Erne-Hryckowian-Blackwell
Bäck-Hyry-Bastian

Lindell-Heiskanen
Harley-Lundkvist
Bichsel-Lyubushkin

Oettinger

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Vancouver tried this:

Kane-Pettersson-DeBrusk
O’Connor-Rossi-Boeser
Ohgren-Blueger-Garland
Hoglander-Kampf-Karlsson

E. Pettersson-Hronek
M. Pettersson-Willander
Buium-Joseph

Tolopilo

After-AfterThoughts

• One quick word on winning streaks: If we’re going to be fastidious with our language, then we need to point out that until 2005, NHL games could end in ties. So while it’s very remarkable that this Dallas team has set the record for consecutive wins, you also have to acknowledge streaks like the 15-game undefeated run the 1998-99 team put up, where they won twelve games, with three ties mixed in. How the game has changed since then!

  

  Hockey-Reference.com

• With that said, how remarkable is it that this Stars team has been the one to put up this streak? There have been so many moments where they could have taken a game off, but instead, they’ve just kept honing their craft and raising their game. These wins really are night-and-day when you hold them up in comparison to the wins of the first 30 games of the season.

• Defenseman Tyler Myers skated in warmups for Vancouver, but he didn’t play in the game. It is four days until the trade deadline, you might have heard, and players like Myers are Being Preserved.

• Watching Lian Bichsel pull the 5-foot-9 Marco Rossi away from the goal was very much like watching a steward at a soccer game keeping a half-drunk fan from causing too much trouble.

• I mentioned this earlier in the season, but Vancouver coach Adam Foote’s connection to Matt Duchene is a fun one to revisit, if you’re so-inclined.

• Nils Lundkvist jumped into the play in the second period, and his net drive might have been a factor in Tolopilo’s struggles to hang onto Wyatt Johnston’s subsequent shot. It was good to see Lundkvist being aggressive like this.

• Colin Blackwell had a very nice game tonight even outside of his goal, creating multiple problems for the Canucks with his forechecking, and generally infusing the best kinds of energy into his linemates during his shifts. What looked like a potentially sleepy game early never ended up going that way, and Blackwell was a big part of that.

• Razor pointed out an odd stat on the broadcast: after Lian Bichsel’s goal, every defenseman has now scored at least one goal since the last time Heiskanen scored a goal (on December 11 in Minnesota).

• Matt Duchene definitely forced a pass over to Steel that he probably should have shot, but with the score 5-1 and with Duchene having already scored on a pass from Steel earlier, you couldn’t really blame him for trying to return the favor. This is just elite athletes finding ways to (almost) do remarkable things, even when everyone on the ice knows exactly what they’re trying to do.

• Lian Bichsel recalled something from his draft interview during the postgame media tonight: He has been working on developing his offensive game for a while now, and you could see the fruits of his labor. How many teams would love to have a player like him at just 21 years old? My goodness.

• Nate Bastian had six recorded hits tonight. That’s a lot.

• Lian Bichsel only had one hit, but when he’s outscoring his hits total like he did tonight, nobody is going to complain.

  • (Except for that one guy who always complains, but who cares about that guy?)

• Arttu Hyry continued his faceoff excellence by going 9-for-12 in this one, and he even had a look at the net late in the third. It would’ve been a gratuitous bit of joy, had he managed his first NHL goal. Can’t blame anyone for being greedy in this one, though.