In Dallas, Scott Wedgewood made 24 saves , and the Stars shut out the Tampa Bay Lightning, 1-0, on Tuesday night.
“Probably the best structured game I’ve probably been a part of on both sides of the puck,” Wedgewood said. “That’s what we need, we need that from everybody, we need that all-in effort. Guys are banged up and bleeding at the end of it. But that’s a playoff game, and we’re going to need that to win. It’s impressive to watch.”
Dallas is 6-2-1 in their last night games, and improved to 41-27-4.
“That was playoff hockey,” Stars coach Rick Bowness said. “That’s probably the best game of the year. It’s a 1-0 game with plenty of scoring chances at both ends, great goaltending. Just great second efforts tonight. You saw guys diving in front of shots and taking hits to make plays; that’s what it’s all about. We talked to them this morning, it’s all-in now. We’re all-in, everybody. And we had everybody on it tonight.”
Tampa dropped to 44-21-8.
“We’ve given up two goals in the last three games, and we’ve lost two of them,” Lightning captain Steven Stamkos said. “The defensive side has been a lot better, but you also can’t win a game when you don’t score. It’s just about finding that balance now.”
Roope Hintz scored in the 16th minute of the third period for the game’s only offense.
“There wasn’t much time left, and the fans were going crazy,” Hintz said. “They were great today. They’ve been like that every game we’ve played here. It’s so nice to play [at home].”
Andrei Vasilevskiy made 28 saves in the Tampa loss.
“[Wedgewood] didn’t see enough shots,” the Lightning’s Pat Maroon said. “We didn’t get enough shot volume, so we made it an easy night for him. Not saying he didn’t play good. We didn’t make it hard on him. Towards the end there when he was scrambling there, that was probably the most pressure we put on him as far as the game went on. We’ve got to get back to that.”
You must be logged in to post a comment.