Dallas Stars Learn Hard Lesson From Playoff Team

The Dallas Stars traveled to St. Louis and fell in an excruciating game three loss to the Blues. There are plenty of lessons they must learn from if they are to continue succeeding.

Sometimes it’s a struggle to be a dedicated sports fan. When you love a team as much as life itself, they are sure to cause you plenty of joy and plenty of pain.

The Dallas Stars are a perfect example. Depending on how long you have been a dedicated follower of the team, you have more than likely experienced moments of overwhelming happiness and bitter sorrow. You can look at a longterm scale and point out how the Stars were a dominant team from 1999-2008 before falling into a five-year playoff-less rebuild, only to hit an on-and-off spurt over the past three seasons.

Or you could even apply this situation to the 2015-2016 season alone. The Dallas Stars stormed out of the gate, posting the best record throughout the NHL by the time the new year turned and 2016 began. Then came a bitter nosedive in January that saw the Stars flounder with an ugly 3-6-2 month. They slowly recuperated and eventually regained the title of best team in the Western Conference by the final game of the year.

Going into the Stanley Cup Playoffs, the Stars owned the top spot in the Western portion of the bracket. They faced off with an ailing last-place Minnesota Wild club that made things interesting in what would eventually turn into a six-game series. Dallas escaped with the 4-2 victory, but there were plenty of weak points exposed by the Wild in the Stars’ scheme.

Moving on to the second round, the Dallas Stars were picked to play the underdog role against a competent and confident St. Louis Blues team that had spent their first round knocking off the reigning Stanley Cup champions.

The Stars paid no attention to the predictions and played a dominant game one to beat the Blues and take a series advantage. Game two rolled around, and the Stars once again put it all out on the line but slipped just enough for the Blues to get by in an overtime victory.

Then came the shift to St. Louis for games three and four. In the span of one night, Stars fans went from being confident that the team could clinch a victory in the semifinals series to predicting that they only had two games left before a long offseason.

What could have happened in that 60-minute frame of game three that poisoned the Dallas Stars so badly? Well, to put it plainly, a lot of things.

Going into enemy territory, the Stars were almost facing a must-win scenario for game three. They ended up slipping in just about every area possible (offense, defense, goaltending, special teams) and collapsed hard in a 6-1 defeat.

Maybe it was the overbearing home-ice advantage backing the Blues? Or maybe the Blues just showed up better prepared? Maybe the Stars experienced an off night? Perhaps it was a mixture of all of these things?

Whatever it was, it’s clear that Dallas was not ready for what was thrown at them.

A hockey team usually does not win when they are outshot 39-26, outdone in the face-off dot 42-31, outhit 34-27, and forced into finishing an ugly 0/4 on the power play and 5/7 on the penalty kill. Not to mention that they gave up six unanswered goals. Colton Sceviour tallied an early goal to take the 1-0 lead, and it was all St. Louis from there.

Kari Lehtonen had to replace Antti Niemi early in the second period after Niemi surrendered three goals on a mere 12 shots. That is the second game in a row where the Stars have been forced to make a goalie change.

Jamie Benn was called on two separate penalties, as was Vernon Fiddler. Considering they are leaders, they will more than likely be taking the blame for this game, as they do every game. But all in all, their efforts were not very beneficial to the Stars’ overall success.

But as the wise Frederick Douglass once said, “There is no progress without struggle.” This directly correlates with the Dallas Stars’ current state.

Game four will be just as unforgiving as game three was unless the Stars can learn from the mistakes they committed. Only this time, a loss in game four will officially have Dallas dangling over the offseason abyss for the remainder of the series.

So these next 36 hours or so are a crucial time for the Stars to lick their wounds, correct their mistakes, and catch the Blues in their hubristic state in game four. That is exactly the strategy that St. Louis used after their defeat in game one, and it paid off in game two. Dallas needs to figure out how to replicate that in their own favor.

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It may seem impossible after how ugly last night was, but there is still plenty of life left in this bunch. For all of those calling that this was the final straw and that the camel’s back is officially broken, remember that it is one win. The fact that it was a 6-1 blowout means nothing. At the end of the day, it only counts as one win. It was a dominating one, but domination and squeaking past hold the same value.

Special teams, shutdown defense, offensive power, and a more aggressive forecheck seem to be the highlights for the Dallas Stars to focus on. They have just a few hours to get things reorganized and take it to the Blues on Thursday at 7:00 p.m.

As I have said so many times this season, this Stars team is special in the fact that they always know how to surprise us. Whether that surprise includes dealing a fatal blow in a gut-wrenching loss or dominating against the league’s best team, they always seem to have a trick up their sleeves.

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So don’t give up, Dallas Stars fans. Losing sucks, and this Stars team understands that more than most. They don’t want it to happen just as much as we don’t, so keep an open mind going into game four and keep your faith and energy alive. After all, this is the Stanley Cup Playoffs. Every little bit helps.