Game 72 AfterThoughts: Long Night on Long Island
The team looks thin right now
SotG
Don't give up fighting ‘til nothing else stands in your way
Don't give up talking until there's nothing left to say
But no matter what you do
Don't ever compromise what you believe
After a wide-open frenzy against New Jersey, a 2-1 nailbiter could have been a good return to form for a team looking to return to its defensive identity.
Instead, the result wound up being another one-goal loss that might pay dividends down the road but counts the same in the standings. Dallas paid for an early mistake, got another bad break, and only got one puck past Ilya Sorokin.
So, was this game a step in the right direction, given how badly the New Jersey game went?
“Yes and no,” Gulutzan said, “We’re far away from the game we were playing eight or nine games ago, but moving in the right direction. I thought there was a good goalie performance by both goalies. I thought their goalie, Sorokin, was really, really good. You get that. You got a team fighting for their lives. I thought we battled and competed. It was very even. We just couldn’t get a second one by him.”
Indeed, Sorokin was that, especially on the Stars’ power plays. But when you break down the even-strength looks, it wasn’t as though Dallas was quite firing on all cylinders.
Honestly, Jake Oettinger was great after that early Bo Horvat goal, including a spectacular glove save on Kyle MacLean to keep the game within reach. He put up a .920 save percentage on the road, for a team looking fairly anemic offensively tonight. But as thin as this team is looking (and feeling) right now, that early Bo Horvat goal loomed large.
That wouldn’t be the game-winner, on account of the golden hands of Matthew Schaefer, who magicked a puck off a variety of skates and pads before it rattled past Oettinger on a chance the goaltender should bear no burden of guilt for allowing.
“The goal in the third, it deflects twice,” Gulutzan said. “Off a skate, off a pad, off a skate again. They go in, they don’t go in. We stayed with it. We stayed with it. But we’ve got another level, and we need to find it.”
Dallas just didn’t find that level often enough tonight, and it was apparent up and down the lineup. During their recent hot streak, the Stars were getting goals from everyone, and stout defensive play from shift to shift. Right now, the scoring is sporadic at best—and nigh invisible if it’s not coming from the top guys—while the defense is getting exploited more often than it has any right to.
“There’s a natural little dip sometimes, when you see that ‘X’ beside your name,” Gulutzan said. “It’s where you grow though, when you can rise up and still beat these teams. We’re not there yet. We’ve got to get out of our lull a little bit, because there’s no light switch when you go into the playoffs that you can just turn it on, and start playing good. You wanna make sure you’re ironing out the kinks now. We ironed out a few tonight, but not enough.”
Dallas will have to iron out the next set of kinks with a new lineup, quite possibly, after Sam Steel left the game early in the third period and did not return. Michael Bunting was probably going to draw back into the lineup on Saturday regardless, but a potential injury to a key depth player makes Bunting’s finding his fit in the lineup that much more crucial.
This game felt, to be honest, like the vast majority of “Stars at Islanders” games over the past decade and change. Maybe some malaise is just always in the air in cross-conference tilts like this, even with the Islanders hanging onto the last playoff spot in the East. Or maybe they were just confused, because Patrick Roy told every player that he would kick them off the team if they didn’t find a way to hit Mikko Rantanen tonight, and multiple players got stuck clomping up the stairs to the press box while wearing skates. I’m sure we all have our theories.
In any case, the Stars need a win, and soon. It’s one thing to get a little less focused when you’ve already clinched your playoff spot, but it’s another thing entirely to see even the top guys making mistakes they usually don’t make. Something just feels slightly off about the group right now, and I don’t think it’s a problem they can effort their way out of.
Unfortunately, they may not have any other choice but to do so, until a certain superstar winger returns.
Highlights and the Lowdown
Bo Horvat is a very good player, a perennial 30-goal scorer. And tonight, he once again hit 30 goals to open the scoring when he beat Jake Oettinger off the rush with a nice shot in a spot goalies don’t love allowing pucks to get through: the short side.
In fairness, Heiskanen is forced to kind of choose between two guys here, as the Stars don’t handle the neutral zone well enough here in transition.
It’s not the worst goal you’ll ever see, but it’s not defended quite as well as it might have been, which has been a trend in recent games.
Adam Erne took a slashing penalty on Matt Schaefer soon after the goal after some more Islanders pressure, but Dallas got the best chance of the two minutes, when Blackwell did some good work and sprung Steel on a shorthanded breakaway, only to have Ilya Sorokin’s right pad remind everyone why the goalie is in the Vezina conversation this year.
The best look down the stretch came when Jamie Benn was able to clear a puck along the boards to create a 2-on-1 for Duchene with Adam Erne. Duchene chose “pass” on the rush, and Erne fired it, but Sorokin once again got over to deny the great scoring chance.
Dallas got more looks as the period wound down, with a couple strong shifts spent cycling in the offensive zone. The top line in particular did a lot of good work with two minutes to go, but they couldn’t really test Sorokin with anything premium, as the Isles were just barely able to maintain defensive posture.
After 20 minutes, the 1-0 score was still in place, with shots on goal at 9-6 for the Long Islanders.
A relentlessly uneventual second period was finally given some life after a slashing penalty to send Dallas to the power play. It was a good power play, if not a successful one for Dallas, as Sorokin came up with three high-grade stops, including a tricky five-hole attempt by Duchene.
You got the feeling that nothing was going to come easily for Dallas in this one, and we played on at 5-on-5.
Horvat nearly scored a second goal from the same spot after a bit of a good bounce for New York off a rush, but Oettinger escaped long enough for Johnston to take a holding penalty at the end of a lot of Isles pressure, and the penalty kill was put back to work. But once again, they shut down New York.
The most dangerous chance came afterward, when Simon Holmstrom got a puck at the netfront and tested Oettinger. But as he’d done since Horvat’s early goal, Oettinger held firm.
Dallas nearly tied it up in the final seconds of the period when Jason Robertson managed to extract a puck from Adam Pelech and feed Mavrik Bourque with a second left to play. But Pelech was spared his coach’s full wrath, because Bourque had to lean forward to shoot the puck, and thus wasn’t able to elevate it.
Shots on goal sat at 17-16 after 40 minutes.
Not every shot is created equal, but sometimes it’s not the shot itself, but what happens after you release the puck that gets the job done. That was the case on the Islanders’ second goal, when Matt Schaefer threw a prayer at the crease, and it rattled perfectly off some skates and back against the grain in cruel fashion.
It was a tough break for the Stars, as both Myers and Oettinger were doing pretty much what you’d want here. But sometimes, the breaks just don’t go your way, and when you haven’t scored any goals yourself, those breaks can be costly indeed.
Still, Oettinger kept doing what he could to keep Dallas in it, and his glove save on Kyle MacLean did just that, when it looked for all the world like it was about to be 3-0, only not to be.
Heiskanen then got room to come down the slot and fire a puck on Sorokin, but the Isles goalie came up to challenge and won the duel, with Dallas still looking for their first goal in what was shaping up to be a pretty frustrating night.
As time in the third period ticked away, it was looking like one of those nights where Dallas just didn’t have the keys to the doors they needed to get through. And to make matters worse, Sam Steel also left the Stars’ bench in the third period, presumably to tend to some sort of malady.
Still, Dallas fought on. Blackwell drew a penalty on another strong offensive-zone shift, and the power play had another chance to get the game going. They peppered shots at Sorokin, but the home side’s penalty kill prevented the most venomous chances from getting through, and nothing came of the opportunity.
Uncharacteristically, Heiskanen and Lindell had a rough go of things with six minutes to play, and two failed clearances gave Casey Cizikas and Kyle MacLean two great looks, both of which Oettinger disdainfully rejected.
Ilya Sorokin got some good fortune along with his excellent play on the night, as the Stars’ fourth line had a couple of close calls that just didn’t bounce their way late in the third, with Arttu Hyry’s final whack not quite being enough to get him his first NHL goal.
Gulutzan went ahead and pulled Oettinger with four minutes to go in a 2-0 game, and why not? The Stars went to work with a 4F/2D setup, and they would score on the wackiest of players, as Thomas Harley slid to block a puck in the neutral zone as the Islanders rushed at an empty net with numbers. And somehow, it worked: Harley got the puck, Dallas had numbers of their own, and Duchene finished the chance to make the final two minutes interesting.
Alas, it was too little, too late. Dallas mustered more possession in the final 90 seconds, but Sorokin never had to be spectacular, and the clock ran out with the 2-1 score favoring the home side.
Dallas will head to Pennsylvania this weekend in search of snapping a bona fide losing streak.
Lineups
Dallas trotted out these folks:
Robertson-Johnston-Bourque
Steel-Duchene-Benn
Erne-Hryckowian-Blackwell
Bäck-Hyry-Bastian
Lindell-Heiskanen
Harley-Lundkvist
Bichsel-Myers
Oettinger
The Isles responded with this group:
Lee-Horvat-Heineman
Ritchie-Schenn-Barzal
Palat-Pageau-Holmstrom
MacLean-Cizikas-Gatcomb
Schaefer-Pulock
Pelech-Soucy
Mayfield-Boqvist
Sorokin
After-AfterThoughts
Michael Bunting was a healthy scratch in this game. Glen Gulutzan said this of the decision on Thursday afternoon: "It's the right thing to kind of watch the game and reset. Now he's in the mold of the team, and it's never a bad thing. We're hoping we're gonna get 'Rants back here in a few days, and that'll change the complexion of things even more."
The way I read the decision, it’s similar to sitting Myers the other night: give Bunting a game to reset, and also try out one of the team’s more familiar combinations in his absence just to try getting some folks going after a bit of a lull. We’ll see what happens in Pennsylvania.
One other thing about that first Isles goal: Look at Oettinger here after he’s pushed over to face Horvat following the pass to the wing
I don’t hate Oettinger’s positioning here, actually. You probably wouldn’t hate him being just a tick further towards the shooter, but certainly he’s well-prepared for a shot five-hole here. Anyway, Horvat elevates it masterfully over Oettinger’s right shoulder, and that was that. Grouse about goaltending if you want, but this is a shot from a scoring area that Heiskanen wasn’t able to shut down after too-easy transition from New York. Some of these are going to go in, no matter who the goaltender is, and Oettinger made a few big ones tonight. Sometimes, the offense just can’t get the job done, and tonight was that night.
Looking at Sam Steel’s last shift, he appeared to be holding his groin after racing down the ice. To my eyes, that’s the most likely culprit for his absence from the game after that point, but we’ll have to wait and see, for now.
After Steel went down, Hryckowian was moved up next to Benn and Duchene for a bit, with Bourque centering Blackwell and Erne for a shift later on. But I wouldn’t read all that much into the final 15 minutes of this one, given how much of it was filled with special teams/a desperate comeback attempt/6-on-5 play.
If Steel misses time, it naturally opens up a spot for Michael Bunting to draw back in next to Benn and Duchene. But with Rantanen also likely to return in the next two or three games, the wingers will likely be rotating regardless.
Man, you really noticed the absence of Roope Hintz tonight. Dallas just isn’t as dangerous without him, and they struggled to break down the Isles’ defense at times, both at 5-on-5 and the power play. The final ten games might be long indeed if they can’t find some more depth production soon.
Matt Duchene, celebrating
