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Dallas Stars Daily Links: Dallas Caps Off 2019 With a Win

Against all odds, the Stars came back to beat the Coyotes thanks to a strong third period. Plus, John Tortorella made highlights with a post-game rant, the worst NHL contracts of the decade, and more.

Don’t let anyone sugarcoat it — the Dallas Stars were bad for the first two periods of last night’s game against the Arizona Coyotes.

Yet somehow the team finally put the pieces together and scored four unanswered goals in the fourth to take home the win. And in the end, that’s what really matters:

“There was some small talk,” captain Jamie Benn said sarcastically of the first intermission dressing room. “We needed a kick in the butt, and we found a way to come back.”

Some bad blood was spilled as each team traded hit after hit, not all of which were legal (regardless of whether or not they were called as penalties). But the Stars didn’t let the Coyotes get under their skin, instead using that energy to fuel their comeback:

“They got some hits at us early, we didn’t like them, the penalty killing did the job, and we just kind of picked it up from there,” said Stars interim coach Rick Bowness. “We had a lot of guys that responded. No one was happy and we just responded. It’s as simple as that.”

You can read more from Mike Heika here.

Stars Stories

Here are the full quotes from Rick Bowness:

Here’s Roope Hintz, who scored the game winner for the Stars:

And here’s Anton Khudobin, who was the only reason Dallas had a chance to win the game to begin with:

From pregame warm-ups — doesn’t this just warm your heart?

Around the League

T’was a decently busy Sunday night for the Central Division:

  • In the sole inter-division matchup of the night, the St. Louis Blues had a decisive 4-1 win over the Winnipeg Jets. [NHL]
  • Elsewhere the Minnesota Wild fell 3-1 at home to the New York Islanders. [Hockey Wilderness]
  • Finally, the Chicago Blackhawks came from behind to eek out a 3-2 win over the Columbus Blue Jackets in the shootout. [Second City Hockey]/

Speaking of the Chicago-Columbus game, national treasure John Tortorella made headlines due to his post-game rant about the NHL’s referees and review process:

(For context: Zack Werenski had a goal disallowed in overtime because the clock expired less than a second earlier. Later in the shootout, Joonas Korpisalo got injured and left the game.)

Moving on, here’s a feel-good(?) story for the day:

Say what you will about the Stars, but at least they don’t hand out albatross contracts:

Conspiracy theory time: the NHL no longer lets players go to international tournaments because the U.S. would win it all, hurting Canada’ feelings.

Finally...

Thanks to everyone who game out to Craft and Growlers last night for our meetup! For those of you who weren’t there...

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