Dallas Stars: Why Win Over Anaheim Ducks Can Help Team On Road Trip
There wasn’t much doubt that the Dallas Stars would defeat the Anaheim Ducks from the drop of the puck on Thursday night. But after seeing it all play out through 60 minutes, there was a lot to like and a lot that could end up helping them on the upcoming road trip.
It’s fair to say that the Dallas Stars were a much different team 13 days ago when they played the Anaheim Ducks for the first time.
In their first showdown with Anaheim back on Saturday, Oct. 13, the Stars put together a historic comeback. After finding themselves down 3-0 halfway through the game, Dallas rallied with a historic comeback. They put up 30 shots in the second period, scored four unanswered goals in less than nine minutes, and sealed the deal with an empty-net goal from Radek Faksa in the third period to secure the 5-3 victory.
It wasn’t the cleanest win, but they found a way to get the job done.
But following their comeback victory, the Stars fell into a rut. They lost three straight contests, including two on the road, and were outscored 10-2 in the process. Their offensive pressure and production went flat, their defense looked deflated, and neither goaltender seemed able to hold the struggling team in front of them in the game.
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The Dallas Stars sunk to 3-4-0 on the year and hit the last place mark in the Central division. It was a bad look and a quick drop for a team that had built so much early promise, and required the Stars to make some fast strides to get out of it.
They did just that, reaching for a gritty 4-2 win over the Los Angeles Kings on Tuesday night as they returned to home ice. The win got them back to the .500 mark in the standings, but there was plenty of work left to be done. Still, it looked as though the team might be returning to its prior form.
And then came Thursday night’s contest against the Ducks. This game was important for a few different reasons.
For one, the Stars had already beaten the Ducks once in the season and had a good grasp of what they were up against, unlike with other teams. To add on to that, Anaheim was struggling in their own right, having lost three games in a row. And to top it all off, it was the Stars’ final home game before a dreadful season-long six-game road trip goes into effect.
And, after a sluggish 10 days of trying to reassert themselves, the Dallas Stars passed with flying colors.
Dallas cruised past Anaheim with a 5-2 victory to improve to 5-4-0 on the season. But it wasn’t just the two points that mattered. Instead, it was how the Stars went about getting the win.
The Stars opened up the scoring with a smooth goal from Jason Dickinson. It was his first goal of the season and once again assisted in showing signs of life for the Stars’ depth scoring. After surrendering a tying goal to Ryan Getzlaf, Stars defenseman Roman Polak answered back with a slick backhand score to make it 2-1.
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Getzlaf scored again to make it a 2-2 tie early in the second period, and that’s when the Stars busted the game wide open.
Miro Heiskanen, Mattias Janmark, and Jason Dickinson (his second goal) all found the back of the net in the final 15 minutes of the game as the Stars turned a close game into a blowout against a Western Conference foe.
The Stars were the better team overall. They were faster, more relentless on offense, more aggressive and structured on defense, made minimal mistakes, and kept the pressure on for a full 60 minutes.
And for the second straight game, the Dallas Stars emerged victorious without Jamie Benn, Tyler Seguin, or Alexander Radulov (who missed both games) scoring a goal. The depth scoring was prominent yet again and helped carry the Stars to a big win.
Dallas got dirty when they had to, played a physical brand of hockey, and won the mental battle as well. Everything that Stars fans had been worried about going into Thursday night quickly evaporated as the team took control of the game.
And that’s just what they needed at this point in the year. On Sunday afternoon, the Dallas Stars will kick off a six-game road trip throughout the northeast. It will be their longest swing of the season and take them both to struggling teams like Detroit as well as powerhouses like Toronto, Boston, and Columbus.
The Stars are already 0-2-0 on the road this year after posting an abysmal 16-20-5 road record in 2017-18. Playing away from home has been one of the Stars’ biggest issues over the past few years and has to be fixed before Dallas can take the next step and get back into the playoff mix.
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That must be addressed in this upcoming swing. And after Thursday night’s win, the Stars should be ready to meet it head-on.
That’s because Dallas did all of the right things on Thursday. It wasn’t an “ugly” win by any means. The Stars dominated the game, fixed all of their inconsistencies, and looked like a really good team in the win over Anaheim.
As a result, they know what they are capable of doing. They know that they have the tools to fix their problems and know that they can be dangerous when they fire on all cylinders.
Playing on the road is more of a mental game than anything, and the Stars must fix that. But they now have the confidence in knowing that they can do so.
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Thursday night’s game should provide a massive boost as the Dallas Stars approach this 10-day trip up north. There’s confidence once again in the locker room and in the system, and confidence can get teams a long way in today’s game.
All they have to do is go out there and use it.