The Dallas Stars no longer own home-ice advantage after dropping the opener of their best-of-seven Western Conference first-round series 4-3 against the defending Stanley Cup champion Vegas Golden Knights on Monday.
Despite the turn of events, there was no sense of panic among coach Peter DeBoer’s squad as the Stars head into Game 2 on Wednesday at Dallas.
The Stars have been in this position before. Twice last season, en route to the Western Conference final, Dallas overcame an early series deficit.
Dallas bounced back from home overtime losses in Game 1 to defeat both the Minnesota Wild in six games and the Seattle Kraken in seven games before falling to the Golden Knights in the 2023 Western Conference final.
“Been here before,” said Stars goaltender Jake Oettinger, who stopped just 11 of 15 shots in Game 1. “It’s not the end of the world. Not an ideal start, but everyone is going to look at our game and try and be better. It starts with me. Try and be better and go from here.”
Said DeBoer: “It’s all about your response. If you’re going to win this time of year, you’ve got to respond.”
There were some positives for Dallas, which finished as the No. 1 seed in the Western Conference with 113 points.
After falling behind 3-2 in the first period, the Stars clamped down defensively, allowing just a Brayden McNabb goal the rest of the way. Dallas, which had a first-period goal wiped away after a coaches’ challenge for offsides, outshot the Golden Knights 29-15, including 19-7 over the final two periods.
“I definitely felt like we were getting to our game the second half of the game,” said Stars forward Mason Marchment, who scored to make it 4-3 midway through the third period. “It’s going to be a good battle. This series is a long ways from over. We’ve got a lot of believers in this group and no quit here.”
It was a storybook start for Vegas, which scored on two of its first three shots. Captain Mark Stone, playing for the first time since a lacerated spleen on Feb. 20, scored a power-play goal on a deflection after Dallas center Sam Steel was whistled for a high-sticking penalty just 26 seconds into the game.
“I was actually pretty nervous before the game,” Stone said. “Haven’t played hockey in a while, but once you get into the flow of things, you remember why you do it. That was awesome. Rest and get ready for Wednesday. We’ve got to bring our A-game because they’re going to be coming.”
It was Stone’s 35th career playoff goal, 30 of which have come with the Golden Knights. Vegas finished 2-for-2 on the power play while Dallas finished 0-for-2.
“It was a pretty tightly contested game,” Stone said. “I think the difference in the game was special teams. Did a good job on the power play … and killed penalties and stayed with it.”
Vegas led 2-0 after 8:27 after a goal from Jonathan Marchessault and 3-1 late in the first period after a power-play goal by Tomas Hertl. It was too deep a hole for the Stars to dig out from.
“I thought, if you’re going to knock off the Stanley Cup champion, you’re going to have to bring your A-game every night,” DeBoer said. “… We did some things well, but we were chasing the game the whole night from the first shot of the game on. Tough to play behind against that team.”
–Field Level Media