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Stars Survive Late Push, Get Black Friday Win Over Avalanche

taylor newby
·4 min read

It was a familiar sight as the Dallas Stars came together to celebrate a victory at the end of Friday's game against the Colorado Avalanche.

In the first game between the two teams since Dallas eliminated Colorado in Game 6 of last year's second round playoff series, the result was the same, with the Stars prevailing this time by a score of 5-3. Colorado threatened to come back in the third period, but an empty net goal sealed the win. The victory comes after two brutal losses on the road to the Carolina Hurricanes and Chicago Blackhawks.

Before morning skate, the Stars recalled Alexander Petrovic from the Texas Stars, which was a bit of a surprise as there was no injury update about any blueliners. At morning skate, head coach Pete DeBoer announced that both Brendan Smith and Matt Dumba would be healthy scratches, meaning Nils Lundkvist and Petrovic would slot in.

Related: Dallas Recalls AHL Defenseman for Blueline Help

This was a statement made by DeBoer that he is not happy with some of the progress he has seen from newcomers Smith and Dumba, and believes they are "running out of runway" when it comes to learning the system and giving the team the best chance to win. The statement was made even bigger that DeBoer was choosing to use an AHL defenseman against the Avalanche of all teams, who have some of the most dangerous offensive players in the league.

The game started off strong for Dallas, who excel when scoring the first goal this year. Only a couple minutes into the first period, the Stars were on the power-play, which going into the game was ranked a disappointing 25th in the league. After a rough start to the man-advantage, unable to hang on to the puck or enter the zone, the second unit finally got a play set up and a rebound and pass from Mason Marchment found Tyler Seguin, who got his ninth of the year and snapped the power-play drought with a snipe from below the dot.

About ten minutes later, the Avs got their first shot at the power-play and none other than former Stars forward Valeri Nichushkin evened things up. Nichushkin only recently returned from a stint in the NHL Player's Assistance Program that began all the way back in the second round series against Dallas last season.

However, the Stars got the lead back after Miro Heiskanen and Mason Marchment were jamming at a loose puck around Alexander Georgiev and Marchment was able to cash in to make it 2-1. There was some back and forth on who got credited for the goal, but it was determined that Marchment was the last one to touch it before going in the net.

The second period was all Stars, completely dominating the game for all 20 minutes. They weren't giving the Avalanche much and if Colorado was getting chances, Jake Oettinger was there to shut it down. Jamie Benn extended the lead to 3-1 after Sam Steel fought to move the puck through the zone and Heiskanen took a wrist shot that created a rebound, falling perfectly for Benn to push into a wide open net.

Both teams spent a lot of time in the penalty boxes last night, and on the Stars fourth power-play attempt, the Stars went tic-tac-toe and found Roope Hintz all alone in front of the net for their second power-play goal of the game.

The Avalanche woke up for the final period, and just 62 seconds in to the third period, Artturi Lehkonen made it 4-2 and it was obvious that the Avalanche had a rousing talk in the locker room to shape things up. Before the halfway mark of the third period, Cale Makar skated through nearly every Stars skater and made a brilliant cross-ice pass to Mikko Rantanen who went bar-down from his favorite spot to shoot from. Suddenly the lead was cut in half and Colorado was only a shot away from tying the game. After allowing five goals in the third period against Carolina earlier in the week, it felt like the Stars were in danger of letting another game slip through their fingers.

The Stars were able to fight Colorado off for a little less than 12 minutes, and at about the three minute mark, the Avs pulled their goalie to make their final push. Almost immediately, Makar whiffed on a pass near the blue line and Marchment capitalized on the misstep, firing a bullet into the back of the net and giving the Stars some insurance with a 5-3 lead. Marchment received first star honors for his performance in the game, and the Stars were able to bounce back from the two tough losses on the road with a Black Friday win at home.

The schedule doesn't get any easier as the league-leading Winnipeg Jets now come to Dallas for a Sunday matinee. Winnipeg dominated their previous matchup in Canada, and the Stars will surely be looking for a better effort in front of their home crowd.

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