Heika’s Take: Duchene plays hero as Stars outdo Blues in wild overtime win

The Stars earned two points on Saturday.

They needed them.

Not only was Dallas coming off a disappointing loss to Nashville, but it dominated Saturday’s contest against the Blues and probably should have had a big lead in regulation. But St. Louis goalie Jordan Binnington was fantastic, and the two teams battled into overtime before Matt Duchene came up with a heroic individual effort to win the game, 2-1, and give the Stars a very good feeling in the process.

“We earned it,” said Stars coach Pete DeBoer. “They didn’t make it easy. They played hard and Binnington was great. But we stuck with it and got an important two points. I liked our game.”

Dallas moves to 18-11-0 and wins for the second time when a game went past regulation this season. St. Louis moves to 14-14-3 and stays in the mix in the middle of the Central Division.

“We deserved the win,” said Duchene, who scored his 13th goal of the season at 2:31 of overtime. “I thought we were really good tonight.”

Duchene was out on the ice with Jason Robertson for a couple of shifts in overtime, and Robertson earned the deployment with maybe his best game of the season. The snake-bit forward blasted home a blazing one-timer to help a struggling power play tie the game in the second period. Jordan Kyrou had given the Blues a 1-0 lead in the first period, but that was the only shot that would get past Jake Oettinger on the night.

It was a strange game for Oettinger, as he faced 16 shots on goal, including just three in the second period. He came up big in the third period and overtime, and prevented a serious tragedy in the process. After all, Dallas would have been significantly dismayed had one of those gone in to cause a regulation loss after 30-plus minutes of sustained pressure.

“Jake played great,” said Duchene. “He matched him. It’s a tougher game when you’re not getting as many shots. It’s tough to stay sharp. But he was great.”

Oettinger is now 11-1-0 at AAC with a 1.99 GAA and .926 save percentage.

The Stars finished with a 37-16 advantage in shots on goal, a 73-40 edge in shot attempts, and more than 40 scoring chances. Dallas also won 62 percent of the faceoffs.

Binnington, who is in contention to be the starting goalie for Team Canada at the 4 Nations Face-Off in February, turned away chance after chance and created some frustration for a Stars team that knows the feeling.

“He’s great,” said Duchene. “There’s a reason he’s going to be the starter for Team Canada. I think he’s one of the more underrated guys in the league. I’ve always found him very tough to score on and he always plays us well.”

That said, the Stars did find a way to beat him. Robertson has been working on his one-timer for the past two seasons and unleashed a beauty on Saturday. He said he was trying to get the goalie to move laterally, and it worked out well. On Duchene’s overtime goal, he took a pass from Esa Lindell deep in his own end and then bolted up the right wing. The left-handed Duchene blew past two defenders and cut in on Binnington, popping a shot to the far post for his 13th career overtime winner.

“I just got a gap on their guys,” Duchene said. “I added a little change of pace and was able to get two guys flat-footed. OT is tough. It was stressful. There’s a lot of ice out there. You’ve got to be patient and aggressive at the same time. It’s a waiting game and I just saw an opening and was able to get the goal.”

DeBoer said getting big goals from big name players is part of the process to get the Stars back into the kind of flow they had last season.

“World class play by Matt Duchene in overtime. That’s just a highly, highly skilled play by him,” DeBoer said. “We’re not scoring easily right now. We’re creating quality chances, they’re just not going in right now. When that happens, you want to make sure you’re picking up points. I like how we’re defending, so that gives us a chance until we get that shooting confidence back.”

For Robertson, a two-point night was needed, and he said it can only help the momentum going forward.

“We want to take the next step,” Robertson said. “I believe in the past couple of games that we have done some good things so we want to try to keep it rolling.”

The Stars will get that chance Monday as they continue a six-game homestand when Washington comes to town.

“If we keep generating like that, we’ll get our swagger going and start scoring more,” said Duchene.

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 X @MikeHeika.