First Shift: Stars get early season “measuring stick” game against Golden Knights

On one hand, Tuesday’s game at Vegas is just one of 82.

On the other hand, it’s a bit more special than that.

The Stars are coming off a four-day break that included a team bonding trip and will charge into T-Mobile Arena to meet the team that eliminated them from the playoffs last season. Dallas lost to Vegas in the Western Conference Final in six games, and the Golden Knights went on to win the Stanley Cup. There are a lot of memories from that game that will help make this one part of a story that could go on for a few years.

“It’s exciting to get back, exciting to see how you stack up against the Stanley Cup champion, exciting to play them again because obviously the last time we played them you don’t have a great taste in your mouth about how that ended,” Stars coach Pete DeBoer said. “Excited because they’re going to be one of those teams that we’re going to have to go through.”

On paper, the Stars and Golden Knights will be among the top teams in the Western Conference this season. That means these points could be massive in the standings. Vegas is already off to a 3-0-0 start while the Stars are 1-0-0 after a shootout win against the Blues last Thursday. The odd break in the schedule created the opportunity for the bonding trip, but also allowed the Stars to work on timing and chemistry. Top center Roope Hintz missed all of training camp and the season opener with an upper-body injury, but he was back practicing with the top line on Friday, and the hope is he was able to get plenty of reps in recent workouts and will slot into the lineup on Tuesday.

Because Tyler Seguin was taking Hintz’s place on the top line throughout training camp, he really hasn’t worked much with newcomer Matt Duchene. The Stars signed Duchene as a free agent over the summer to help add scoring depth to the lineup, and the plan was that Duchene and Seguin might be able to form a line with Mason Marchment that could complement the top line of Hintz with Jason Robertson and Joe Pavelski, as well as the trio of Jamie Benn, Wyatt Johnston and Evgenii Dadonov.

DeBoer said earlier in the summer that the fact Vegas has such good forward depth is one of the reasons the Stars had to improve.

“I think that’s the question that has to be answered,” DeBoer said of his own team’s improvement in that area. “That was the purpose of the moves we made in the summer, was to try to close the gap there. They definitely had a gap on us and everyone else.”

Vegas is dealing with some injuries of its own, but has outscored opponents 12-3 in the first three games. The Golden Knights have outshot the competition on average 32.7-to-26.3. So, again, this should be a great test right out of the gate.

But have the Stars learned from last season?

“There’s always little things when you look back at a series,” DeBoer said. “For me when I look back, they don’t take a lot of penalties, so you’re not going to beat them in a seven-game series with special teams. The margins were razor thin. Those first two overtime games, they won them both. You split those and maybe it’s a different series. Maybe momentum shifts. You have to give them credit. They were the best team in the league last year and they proved it.”

Key Numbers

1.18
During the regular season, Stars goalie Jake Oettinger has gone 4-0-0 against Vegas with a 1.18 goals against average and a .960 save percentage.

5
Stars forward Jason Robertson led the Stars with five goals and six points in six games against Vegas in the playoffs last season.

17
In 15 career regular season games against Dallas, Vegas forward Mark Stone has 17 points (4 goals, 13 assists).

18
The Golden Knights have 18 different players with a point through 3 games this season, which leads the NHL.

He Said It

“I do stress the process over the result more, but the result is important just because it takes that pressure off of you. This group has talked about the previous years to me getting here having to play must-win games down the stretch and that can get really tough and really taxing. So we want to do what we did last year. We want to build a cushion and take a little bit of that pressure off of us.”

- Stars coach Pete DeBoer on how picking up points is key even if the team isn’t playing perfect hockey

This story was not subject to the approval of the National Hockey League or Dallas Stars Hockey Club.

Mike Heika is a Senior Staff Writer for DallasStars.com and has covered the Stars since 1994. Follow him on Twitter @MikeHeika.