The road trip wraps up on Saturday night for the Dallas Stars as they face a surging Carolina Hurricanes team. The stage is set for a pivotal non-conference matchup, with each team in serious need of points.
Every passing game seems to mean a little bit more for the Dallas Stars as they continue their trek through the month of February. As a result, Saturday night’s game seems to carry all the more weight with it.
The Stars will be in Raleigh, North Carolina tonight at PNC Arena as they wrap up a five-game road trip. Their opponent will be a Carolina Hurricanes team that has been surging as of late, which sets the stage for an important showdown on Saturday night.
For Dallas, this almost seems like a “must have” game. Although games like this are uncommon for a team sitting in a playoff spot in February, the last few games have considerably shifted the Western Conference standings.
The Stars began their long road trip last Thursday in Nashville, coming up short in a 3-2 overtime loss. Two days later, they dropped a 3-2 game to the Arizona Coyotes on the other side of the country.
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And, after a brief trip back home for practice, Dallas headed to the east coast for three more road contests. They started the trip with a 3-0 win over the Florida Panthers, but negated it with a 6-0 blowout loss at the hands of the Tampa Bay Lightning two nights later.
As a result, the Dallas Stars boast a 1-2-1 record on this 10-day trip. Going into the swing, the Stars were riding a five-game win streak and had ascended to third place in the Central division.
But after losing three of their last four, Dallas has slipped back into the wild card picture as the surging St. Louis Blues – who won their eighth straight game on Thursday – moved past the Stars in the Central race. Both teams sit at 29-22-5 with 63 points and 29 ROWs, but the Blues own the goal differential tiebreaker.
St. Louis is also in action today against a struggling Colorado Avalanche squad, so the odds seem to be in their favor to pick up two more points and continue their midseason push.
That leaves the Stars with a high bar to meet and little room for error as they finish up their trip on Saturday night.
It won’t be easy, though.
The Hurricanes (30-22-6) are arguably the hottest team in the NHL since the beginning of 2019. After defeating the Edmonton Oilers 3-1 on Friday night, Carolina improved to 14-5-1 in the new year. The hot streak has helped bring the Hurricanes out of the bottom of the Eastern Conference picture and has them just one point out of the final wild card spot in the East.
That’s what they will be fighting for on Saturday as they take on the Stars. The Hurricanes will aim to pick up their sixth win in the past seven games and catapult themselves back into the top eight in the East (depending on how other teams do in a busy Saturday slate).
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Meanwhile, the Dallas Stars will be fighting to keep pace in a busy and loaded Central division playoff race.
The game will offer a different look for the Stars lineup, with the spotlight being on Joel L’Esperance as he makes his NHL debut on the fourth line. The top trio of Benn, Seguin, and Radulov will reunite on the first line, Dickinson will draw in between the veterans Cogliano and Spezza, and Janmark and Ritchie will pair with Faksa on the third line.
Blake Comeau and Ben Bishop will both stay out of the lineup with upper-body injuries. It will be Comeau’s second consecutive game missed, while Bishop will miss his fifth straight contest.
Here is how the Dallas Stars are expected to line up against the Hurricanes:
Jamie Benn – Tyler Seguin – Alexander Radulov
Andrew Cogliano – Jason Dickinson – Jason Spezza
Mattias Janmark – Radek Faksa – Brett Ritchie
Roope Hintz – Joel L’Esperance – Valeri Nichushkin
It’s a showdown between two teams in need of an important two points.
The Dallas Stars will wrap up an important five-game swing tonight in Raleigh against another team fighting for positioning. There’s a need for success and momentum against a team riding a hot streak. Can they find it in Hurricanes country?