In Dallas, the Stars trailed the visiting Arizona Coyotes, 1-0, entering the middle frame on Wednesday night. They reeled off three goals in the frame for a 3-1 lead headed to the third. They tacked on two more in the third for a 5-2 win over the Coyotes. Tyler Seguin had a goal in his return to the Stars bench after missing 11 games.
Jake Oettinger made 23 saves in the win.
Dallas improved to 42-19-9.
“I thought all our defense did a good job, and Nils was part of that. They did a good job of getting the puck to the net,” Dallas coach Pete DeBoer said. “That’s something this year that we’ve tried to preach, is not to complicate the game back there. Just get the puck to the net and get some action around the net. I think probably three of the goals were scored off defensemen getting pucks to the net, and he had two of them.”
Clayton Keller struck with 15 seconds left in the opening stanza to give the Coyotes a 1-0 lead, hitting off a shot from the right circle.
“We did a really good job in the first period of executing our game plan and doing what we tried to do,” Arizona’s John Leonard said. “That was keeping things simple, being hard on the forecheck and good tracks on their rush. All those little things that add up. We did a really good job of that in the first period.”
In the middle frame, the Stars tied the game, 1-1, on a marker from Logan Stankoven at 7:34, scoring on a delayed penalty call.
“Nice to bang one home,” Stankoven said. “I’ve realized not every single goal is going to be pretty for me. It’s just building confidence. Sometimes you have to go to the net and go to the hard areas. It’s good to score in different ways. Playoffs, goals are even harder to come by, so sometimes it’s where you’ve got to go.”
Dallas continued the second period rally with a strike by Jamie Benn at 11:55 for a 2-1 lead, scoring off a deflection at the crease.
Seguin added his marker at 12:24 after taking a nifty behind-the-back pass from Matt Duchene on an odd man rush for a 3-1 lead headed to the third period.
“I thought we should have had four or five rather than just one,” Duchene said of his linemates. “Chemistry is something you can’t quantify. You can work on it always, but when it’s there, it’s there. [Seguin] is a [heck] of a player. You take him out of the lineup, take him off a line, there’s definitely a hole. It was really fun to play that way, kind of picked up where we left off. He had good jump for being out as long as he was.”
Arizona dropped to 28-36-5, snapping a two-game streak.
“We had a good start. In the second, they had a push and we turned the puck over too much,” Arizona coach Andre Tourigny said. “They’re good around the net, and there’s a reason why they’re a Stanley Cup contender.”
In the third period, Jason Robertson stretched the Dallas advantage to 4-1 at 4:12, scoring off a deflection.
The Stars’ Craig Smith ballooned the lead to 5-1 at 5:25, scoring off a rebound.
Leonard picked up a goal for the Coyotes at 8:50 for a 5-2 final count on the scoreboard.
“It feels good to score, and it’s my first one with the Coyotes,” Leonard said. “It felt pretty good. We would have liked to have come out with a win, though.”
Connor Ingram made 28 saves in the win.
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