Stay Observations (Game 62): Dallas goes to the trenches in 5-4 shootout loss to Colorado

A wild one. For all the right AND wrong reasons.

As great as tonight’s matchup was on paper, it was never going to feel like a proper tilt. Dallas is still missing Mikko Rantanen. But the biggest loss was not seeing the full-strength lineups. The Stars added Michael Bunting and Tyler Myers. Colorado added Nazem Kadri and Nick Blankenburg. Only Kulak and Roy were on the ice Friday night.

Instead, it was a proper tilt and then some. We’ll get to the ‘controversy’ in a bit. But before we dig into the grit, grime, and grease of it all it’s worth highlighting that Dallas played a strong team game against the best team in the league. Of course the Stars won’t look perfect, whether at even-strength or special teams. Elite teams tend to make you look ugly. And Dallas made Colorado look just as ugly as they did at times. Even down Mikko Rantanen, they gave as good as they got.

The end result is that there were a lot of unlikely heroes on both sides, between Justin Hryckowian and Scott Wedgewood, who made some of the most tantalizing shootout saves I’ve seen all year. It’s still a brutal outcome, to be sure. Any loss to Colorado all but ensures that Minnesota followed by Colorado is the postseason outcome. And they have two more games versus the Avalanche. Nonetheless, it’s hard to fault the team for putting in the work, and showing that the same process that crushed some the weak teams over the 10-game win streak could also be leveraged against the very best.

This is what two elite teams trading punches should look like.

While it’s a tough loss, hopefully we get clarity on Roope Hintz’ status, along with a look at what Bunting and Myers will look like in victory green. They should get a pretty easy workout on Sunday versus Chicago. However, the rest of the schedule only has two breaks: New Jersey and Philadelphia. That’s it. Every one else Dallas plays this month is in a playoff spot.

Street fighting

The first period was straight chaos. I don’t know how indicative that period was of a potential playoff match, but all I saw was swinging. On the one hand, it’s kind of a silly, bottled little blueprint of how Dallas beats Colorado, which is dragging them into a special teams battle. On the other hand, as bad as Colorado’s power play is, it’s an important reminder that they don’t have bad players on that man advantage; just a bad system developing some bad habits. There’s simply no reason to tempt fate there, even if both calls were super questionable.

Justin ‘Uncle Rico’ Hryckowian

(Sticktap to subscriber Derrick for the nickname) Hryckowian has had a really solid season, but for the most part, his season has been cast as an overachiever type. He’s playing a role larger than his capacity, which is great. But surely we’re not looking at a middle six fixture. Wrong again. This was arguably his best game of the season, and not just because he had two points in one of the biggest games of the season, but because he was making an impact from shift to shift, including the play where he outmuscled Josh Manson (!). It’s telling that he earned shifts at the end of regulation and into overtime.

The Hintz injury

Unfortunately we didn’t get a closeup of the Nathan MacKinnon play on Roope Hintz, but we got a slightly better angle from space.

It’s quite clear, to me at least, that MacKinnon gets his knee inside Hintz’ thigh and lifts as hard as he can in a Judo-type motion. Maybe that’s a little accusatory — Avs fans on Twitter called my IQ into question (which it’s always been, to be fair) — but I feel like I’ve seen enough MMA to identity a tripping motion when I see one. That’s not to say MacKinnon intended to injure Hintz. Hintz is pinning MacKinnon against the wall. MacKinnon has a right to battle back. He does not have a right to trip someone, however, which is what he does.

In a perfect world where the NHL protects its players, MacKinnon gets a suspension because you can’t attack player’s legs. It won’t happen because this is the NHL. Nonetheless, it’s an unfortunate outcome for a team that will need its stars come the postseason. Until there’s official word, however, we can only wait and hope.

Meandering Strays

• Two things can be true at once: officiating was awful (and boy was it ever), and Dallas’ PK needed to be better. I don’t believe the Stars are due for some kind of shorthanded collapse. Their underlying numbers are better than their outcomes. But they’ve fluctuated all season, so you’d like to see some better habits than the early collapse on the first PP goal, and slow reaction on the second one.

• Jake Oettinger has to have goal #4. Oettinger arguably had to have a few more. While I don’t believe we’ll ever get to the discussion given Oettinger’s presence in the locker room, Oettinger’s play this year deserves scrutiny. Casey DeSmith has saved 14.8 goals above expected, which is top 8 in the NHL. Oettinger ranks #51 at minus-.09, below names like Akira Schmid and Eric Comrie. That’s simply not good enough.

• Even though he was called for a penalty on a play that shouldn’t have been a penalty, I dug the fight Mavrik Bourque showed all night.

• For what it’s worth — and I don’t know anything about the guy — this Twitter doctor (I don’t mean that pejoratively; he’s a real doctor who chimes in on Twitter concerning NHL injuries) doesn’t believe Hintz will be out for the season.

• As great as the Avalanche are, it’s hard not to watch them and notice some of the habits that have caught up to them in recent postseason: playing loose with the puck, single players trying to force plays through traffic, and missed defensive zone assignments. They’re arguably the most dangerous team in hockey and tonight was proof of that when it seemed like Dallas was about to run them out of the building. But they’ll be back to being a team of destiny when they become that team again.