The Sober Play-By-Play: Game 48 versus Vegas drew out the best in Dallas
The game of the year gets a Tales From The Clipped.
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Dallas faces off against Vegas for the late game tonight at T-Mobile Arena.
It’s quietly understood that Dallas doesn’t have a proper rival. Sure, there has been an artificial push to make Minnesota and Nashville rivals, but if rivalry is defined by something lasting, then these two teams make no sense. Neither the Wild, nor the Predators, have had any lasting success over the years, and thus pose no threat. This is not a snarky shot at either franchise. It’s just the reality: how many playoff wins do these teams have in the last five years?
Vegas, on the other hand, is starting to fit that bill. Both franchises have been successful recently. The Knights are former Cup champs where the Stars are aspiring ones. Jack Eichel vs. Miro Heiskanen is mandatory viewing. There have been big hits, big fights, and even the thematic component is fitting—with Jim Nill representing traditional conventions of GM behavior, and Kelly McCrimmon representing something more modern, and cutthroat. Fortune favors the bold in McCrimmon’s view, while for Nill, culture begets fortune.
As I wrote last year, playing Vegas in the first round was a good thing. Sean Shapiro had his own argument; namely that it was better to draw them early before the new chemistries of adding Noah Hanifan and Tomas Hertl had crystallized. For me it was (also) about what the symbolism of beating your rivals means. There are no shortcuts in the Stanley Cup Playoffs. There’s only the fury road of puck management, and endurance. If you’re lucky; good health too. Just like your teachers told you: always do the harder homework first.
Last Friday night felt like the rivalry drawing out Dallas’ best in a season where it feels like we haven’t seen their best often enough. Granted, there’s a major asterisk—namely that Vegas was on the second half of a back-to-back. And it’s important not to extrapolate too much from just one game. But a lot of instructive things happened that made me think about the future between these two teams, who may well end up colliding once more in the postseason.
So what did we learn?