Dallas Stars: Benn is back, Stars find success on the road

Get all the latest news on upcoming games, the last week, roster changes, and more on the Dallas Stars as they progress through the rest of the season.

The Dallas Stars just came back from a four-game road trip, where they went a 3-1-0 to capture six out of a possible eight points and stay in the playoff frame for the time being.

Last Week in Review

After defeating the Chicago Blackhawks by a score of 4-3 on Sunday (which was covered in last week’s Bulletin Board), the Stars turned their attention to the Las Vegas Golden Knights, who had just acquired Mark Stone from the Ottawa Senators a day earlier.

The Stars were able to get on the board first. Roope Hintz found the back of the net after a crowd of bodies in and around the crease opened up space for the Finnish speedster to score his fourth goal of the year.

That was about as good as it got for the Stars that night.

Max Pacioretty scored the next two goals of the game—one at 11:48 into the second and the next at 14:52 into the third—to steal the lead from the Stars. Nate Schmidt scored a short while after Pacioretty, and Brayden McNabb scored with just over a minute left in the game to give Vegas a three-goal lead.

Ben Bishop had 44 saves on 46 shots, but Dallas only had one shot in the third period, and Vegas’ offense was rolling, having put up 21 shots of their own in the final 20 minutes of the game.

The Stars then traveled to Hollywood to play the Los Angeles Kings on Thursday, who are second-to-last in the league in points and dead last in the Western Conference.

The game didn’t start like Dallas had planned—Kings’ Captain Anze Kopitar and forward Brendan Leipsic netted their 18th and 5th goals of the season, respectively—and Dallas was down 2-0 after 13:28 minutes of play.

Tyler Seguin scored a minute and 20 seconds after Leipsic’s goal to get Dallas on the board later in the first period.

In the second period, Mattias Janmark broke even by collecting a loose puck in front of the net and backhanding it past Jonathan Quick. It was Janmark’s 6th goal of the season.

The Kings weren’t done yet, though; Kopitar scored his second of the game at 11:46 into the middle period by knocking home a rebound past Anton Khudobin to retake the lead.

The Stars didn’t have an answer until the middle of the third period, where Radek Faksa was able to slam home a rebound off a slap shot from Blake Comeau to tie the game at three.

No goals were scored after Faksa’s, and Dallas headed to overtime for the first time since Feb. 7 when the Stars lost 3-2 to the Nashville Predators in Bridgestone Arena.

But on Thursday night, it was different.

Hintz, who had scored in the last game, was able to whack home the puck after several attempts at 3:19 into overtime to secure Dallas’ first OT winner since Tyler Seguin propelled Dallas to a 2-1 OT victory over the Washington Capitals on Jan. 4.

Dallas’ final game of the road journey was against the St. Louis Blues. Dallas had already beaten St. Louis just nine days earlier by a score of 5-2, effectively ending the Blues’ franchise-record 11-game win streak.

When Dallas faced the Blues again, they had their number. Jamie Benn, who was in his first game back after missing the last game and a half (technically) made his presence known, scoring not only once, or twice, but three times—his fifth career hat trick. Benn’s first tally was a fantastic tip-in off a shot from Taylor Fedun that found a way to get past Blues’ netminder Jordan Binnington.

His second goal came off a sneaky play where Benn looked like he was going to pass the puck cross-crease. Instead, Jamie fired the puck five-hole through the wickets of Binnington.

Here is Benn’s no-look strike:

https://twitter.com/DallasStars/status/1102260562774450178

"“I thought that was a pretty good veteran move against a rookie goalie,” Stars head coach Jim Montgomery said of Jamie’s no-look goal. “I thought he was passing too.”"

The third tally to notch the hat trick was an empty-netter from the neutral zone with 29 seconds left in the contest.

John Klingberg scored his first goal since Feb. 4 after Benn’s first tally of the game in the first period. Klingberg has eight goals and 34 points on the season.

Blues’ defenseman Alex Pietrangelo scored St. Louis’ only goal of the game at 15:40 in the second period, but it was no match for Jamie and the Stars.