In Dallas, the Stars put together a strong, complete game in a win over the Edmonton Oilers on Tuesday night.
Jake Oettinger made 21 saves for the Dallas win.
Edmonton’s Connor McDavid was held off the scoresheet for the first time this season, his point streak ended at 17 games.
“I think we took time and space away from [McDavid] and played him pretty hard, so he didn’t have that much time to make plays,” the Stars’ Miro Heiskanen said. “Of course, he’s a great player, [he’ll] always have some chances, but I think we played pretty well against him tonight.”
Roope Hintz and Jason Robertson scored off the power in the opening period for a 2-0 lead to the stars.
“When we give up two power-play goals — actually three, one right at the end of it — you’re chasing the game,” Oilers head coach Dave Tippett said. “Against a heavy team like that, they’re going to play in front of the puck all night and you get behind, it’s hard to jump back in.”
Denis Gurianov pushed the lead to 3-0 in the middle frame.
“I think [the power play] has been good the entire year,” Dallas’ John Klingberg said. “You’re not going to score every time, but you can build momentum out of it. We’ve got two really good units battling for the ice time, so it’s what you need. I think when you’re competitive like that, you want to be on the ice. Both units are really feeling it right now, so it’s a good thing.”
Dallas improved to 8-7-2.
“We played great team efforts at times,” the Stars’ Joe Pavelski said. “A lot of little things, blocked shots, things that throughout a game a team feeds off of. We’ve simplified a couple things, but good commitment, minds are settling in a little bit, guys are feeling the puck a little bit. It’s going in the net at times. Understanding our game, we have to be patient at times, and knowing that we’re going to create our chances.”
Just 68 seconds after the Gurianov goal, Ryan McLeod scored for the Oilers to get them within 3-1.
“They moved around well,” the Oilers’ Cody Ceci said about the Stars power play. “They’ve [got] two pretty balanced power plays and they showed it tonight. We’ll have to take a look at it, but we’ll have to move on pretty quickly because we have another game tomorrow night (at the Arizona Coyotes).”
The Oilers dropped to 13-5-.0
Luke Glendening added a fourth strike for Dallas in the third period to end the suspense in the match.
“It takes a group of five working together with everyone on the same page,” Dallas head coach Rick Bowness said about limiting Edmonton to one goal. “We try to take away the middle of the ice and push them to the outside. If they come through the middle of the ice, they’re going to do a lot of damage. Our forwards have to come back hard through the middle and protect the middle of the ice while pushing them to the outside and then they’re a little easier to contain.”
Stuart Skinner made 29 saves in the Oilers loss.
“I thought we came out pretty good 5-on-5 and then we took a couple of penalties,” Ceci said. “They scored on them, and we got behind and before I knew it we were chasing the game again. We’ve played pretty good at home, maybe we’ve got to find a way to play a little better on the road.”
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