Dallas Stars Fall Down On Job In Chicago, Drop Another One 3-1
The Dallas Stars couldn’t keep it together for three full periods and fell prey to the Blackhawks in the last contest of their two game roadtrip.
Game Recap
The first period was the most evenly matched, with neither team playing to full potential. Devin Shore scored first in the second period off a mid-air rebound that required some good hand-eye coordination and some determination. Klingberg and McKenzie received the helpers.
The Blackhawks were very quick to retaliate, and got their equalizer from Marian Hossa less than a minute later. It was a long shot that trickled past Kari Lehtonen in the most dreadful of ways. The Blackhawks took off past the Stars then, and Artem Anisimov made it 2-1 in the second.
Artemi Panarin made it 3-1 halfway through the third to put the final nail in the Stars’ coffin.
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Thoughts and Observations
A Shore thing
Most of the Dallas Stars’ reliable offensive cornerstones simply aren’t producing. Jamie Benn, Tyler Seguin, Jason Spezza, and their compadres are having a very hard time putting pucks in the net. While this is creating a world of hurt for the Stars offense, Devin Shore is the kid trying to carry the whole team on his back.
He’s been the only scorer- that’s right, the only one- on the Stars’ weekend roadtrip, and he’s exploded with offensive potential lately.
Since the scoring drought of the greats, the so-called little guys have been stepping up to try and take up the slack. However, this carried the Stars early in the season and only led to burnout and exhaustion.
Unless the Stars can get back to everyone contributing equally, they will be playing exhausted, given up games like tonight for the foreseeable future.
Lehtonen lettin’ ’em in
In his fifth straight start, Kari marred his reputation as the Stars’ solid goalkeeper of the moment. He seemed to be keeping his cool at first, but after Hossa and that first goal, things fell apart.
He took a roughing penalty after “taking out” his frustration on Blackhawk, and his behavior after for the duration of the game seemed to be much more reminiscent of a Kari we knew from last season, who was unable to mentally remain in a game after making a mistake.
And really, it can be argued that Lehtonen’s lack of composure really sucked the confidence out of the Stars’ play tonight. After the multiple goals, the boys in green were playing without any energy, as if it was a sure thing that they were ending up in the loss column tonight.
At the end of the day, something is not clicking with the Stars and it’s something going on between the offense and the goalkeeping- so really, anywhere and maybe everywhere. Although it’s not entirely clear what the Stars need to do to get back on track, it is obvious that it’s nothing they’ve tried yet so far. Perhaps they’ll find it during their break before they take on Anaheim at home on Tuesday.
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