The Dallas Stars put together a solid performance last night, beating the Los Angeles Kings 5-1. But the story of the game wasn’t the final score against a formidable opponent — it was the blender that head coach Pete (not Kalen) DeBoer put the forward lineup through for the game:
Every line save the second was shuffled in some way, with Wyatt Johnston and Joe Pavelski swapping spots as well as Sam Steel and Evgeni Dadonov. When asked about it after the game, DeBoer said that while the second line has been consistently good all year, the others have had their ups and downs. Given that the team is now halfway through the season, he felt patience had run its course and it was time to try and other ways to jumpstart his players.
And to his credit, last night’s game was a great opportunity to do so. Los Angeles was on their final matchup of a six-game road trip, and had just played the Carolina Hurricanes the night before. Dallas, in contrast, just had two days off. Furthermore, the Kings are a good playoff team, albeit one in a bit of a slump (their win over Carolina broke an eight-game losing streak) — if you want to see if your new lines show any real promise, better to see them in action against a good team rather than a basement dweller.
The verdict? Early returns were great, as every line scored except for the second, unchanged trio. Johnston in particular looked like he had a breath of fresh air, scoring his 12th goal of the season along with a primary assist on what looked like the first line of the future. I mean, just look at the #fancystats:
As for the other end of the spectrum, I think the Matt Duchene line had several quality chances, including Mason Marchment getting absolutely robbed in the third, but the lack of production likely hurt them here. It’s also worth noting the entire blueline, save Thomas Harley, got caved in on defense, likely due to that second period (more on that in a bit).
But overall, the blender worked well. And sure, you could chalk the results up to playing a tired, slumping Kings team that looked out of gas in the third period. But how many times have the Stars faced a team who played the night before, only to falter? The expectation for Dallas was to get a win, and the team delivered — that earns them full marks.
• Although the final score indicates a blowout, the mythical “60-minute game” continues to evade the Stars, at least against quality opponents. That was most evident last night in the second period, usually a strong frame for Dallas, in which the Stars tried really hard to blow their two (and then one) goal lead:
There was one Star who didn’t take the second period off, though, and that was Jake Oettinger. He was the reason Dallas survived getting outshot 16-8 in the second, as well as several quality chances in the third before the game got away from Los Angeles. He was near-perfect with 31 saves on 32 shots, with the lone blemish being a 6-on-4 power play goal thanks in part due to a (questionable) delayed tripping call against Radek Faksa (who would nevertheless make it up later with a forced turnover and the primary assist on Sam Steel’s shorthanded goal).
As Sean Shapiro wrote last night, in his past two outings, Oettinger has looked like an NHL All-Star based on performance, not name-recognition. If that holds true for the second half of the season, Dallas is in very good shape.
• An interesting nugget from the broadcast last night was that, in Miro Heiskanen’s absence, only one defenseman has seen their time on ice go down: Ryan Suter. And as humorous as that may be, it’s honestly to be expected — it’s no secret that Suter’s ice time largely comes from being Heiskanen’s partner, and so it stands to reason that without Heiskanen there logging heavy minutes, Suter would in turn not be used as much.
Still, it’s nice to see Dallas turning to other options on the blueline. On the broadcast report, the focus was on Thomas Harley, who, according to the on-screen graphic, has seen the biggest jump in ATOI (+4:49) since Heiskanen’s injury. But that figure’s a little misleading, because it includes the many, many games this season in which Harley has been criminally underplayed this season. If you look solely at the six games before that dreaded Colorado Avalanche game and the six since, Harley’s time on ice has only increased by 3:12.
Using those same guidelines, the defenseman with the largest increase in ATOI is technically Joel Hanley (+4:11), as he’s been forced from “sheltered 7th defenseman playing as a sixth” to “normal third pairing guy.” But in truth, the biggest beneficiary has been Nils Lundkvist — excluding his major ice time boost from the New Year’s Eve blowout of the Chicago Blackhawks, he was averaging 13:55 in his six games before Heiskanen’s injury, a timespan in which (including the Colorado game itself) he was scratched 10 (!) times.
Now? He’s averaging 18:02 (+4:07), notching three points in that time frame, and dare I say he’s looking good? Though the GameScore stats shared previously don’t paint a pretty picture, I thought he was actually solid last night, including perfect defense on a 2-on-1 rush by the Kings during the Stars’ sole power play (he took away the pass, as you always should). He finished at 18:20 at even-strength, behind only Harley.
Has he done enough to get himself out of the proverbial dog house? Probably not, because I (pessimistically) think DeBoer has made up his mind about Lundkvist. But it does offer a small glimmer of hope, in which Heiskanen returns and Lunkdvist might stay a lineup regular, with Hanley going back to spending most nights in the press box. And if not? Well, with the deadline around the corner, maybe Lundkvist has at least upped his stock as part of a rental acquisition.