The NHL playoffs are in full swing right now and the Dallas Stars have a difficult test in the first round against the Las Vegas Golden Knights. Still, the Stars finished with the second most points in all of hockey this season and they were expected to make a deep run in the postseason. After losing games one and two at home, that looks less likely.
Las Vegas is a good team and they are hungry to defend last year’s Stanley Cup win. They are off to a good start as they took game one 4-3 and then they won game two 3-1 on Wednesday night. Stars head coach Peter DeBoer isn’t surprised with how well the Golden Knights are playing in this series.
“They’re the Stanley Cup champions,” Peter DeBoer said, according to an article from ESPN. “They’ve got everyone figured out. They figured out everyone last year, too, right? We’re not alone in that boat.”
That isn’t what Stars fans want to hear. After the regular season that Dallas had, they should be a team that is getting everyone figured out. Now, they are down 2-0 in the series and they have to go on the road. Getting back into this series is going to be difficult.
Last season, the Stars and Golden Knights met in the playoffs as well. Las Vegas obviously won that series, and DeBoer thinks that this year’s series is more even.
“I thought last year, they probably carried the play even though we found a way to scratch out some wins,” DeBoer said. “I don’t think that’s the case this year. It doesn’t feel that way, anyway. It feels a lot more evenly matched.”
Stars felt like they played well on Wednesday night
Hockey can be a funny game sometimes. You can be dominating a stretch and get one unlucky bounce and a game can completely change. The Stars felt like they had a lot of good chances on Wednesday and played well enough to win.
“I think we had our chances, played good enough to win again,” Stars forward Tyler Seguin said. “We just didn’t do it.”
Jason Robertson scored the lone goal for the Stars on Wednesday and he had another good chance in the second period but missed. The chances were there, but that’s just the way it goes sometimes.
“I mean, that’s hockey,” Jason Robertson said. “It goes both ways. They’ve had the same thing, but you just gotta stick with it and try and bear down and get that puck. There’s going to be plenty of opportunities throughout the game to bear down and get it. We gotta do more of that.”
Robertson scored his goal late in the first period to put the Stars up 1-0, but the Golden Knights quickly answered to tie the game heading into intermission. Peter DeBoer thought the first period went well, but it was unfortunate that they went into the locker room with the score tied.
“I loved our first period, and we made one mistake at the end of the first,” DeBoer said. “… You come out of the first with nothing to show for it. I think that was probably a momentum swing. Then, we gotta find a way to score 5-on-5. We generated some chances. You’re not going to get a ton against them just like we’re not going to give up a bunch.”
Now, the series is shifting to Las Vegas as the Golden Knights will be at home for the next two games. Game three will take place on Saturday at 10:30 ET in Las Vegas. The Stars need to get a win and avoid going down 3-0 in the series.
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