Recent struggles are but a minor bump in the road for Jake Oettinger

Jake Oettinger has hit a bump in the road, but the 23-year-old goalie said he's ready to deal with it.
Oettinger has had a pretty smooth start to his career, earning a spot on the roster last season and posting an 11-8-7 record. He was sent to the minors to start this season, but then was called up and followed that with a 9-4-0 record, including some stellar numbers to start the season.

But Oettinger has been pulled in his past two games, including allowing five goals on 19 shots Tuesday to the Montreal Canadiens, and that was a tough lesson.
And while the Stars were unable to capitalize enough offensively, they created a season-high 111 shot opportunities and maybe could've hung in had Montreal not scored five times.
"It's my job to make those saves when our team gives up chances," Oettinger said. "We played really well, and to not be able to make those saves for the guys really hurts me. I just want to be able to help this team win, and I haven't been able to do that the last few games, so it's really disappointing."
Oettinger's numbers have vacillated this season, and he definitely hasn't been at his best in recent games, so there's some concern on how he might come out of this slump. The Stars play back-to-back games twice in the next week, so there's a real chance the challenges will get tougher for the team and for Oettinger.
Stars coach Rick Bowness said he believes Oettinger will battle through.
"These are growing pains," Bowness said. "He's going to win a lot of games for this franchise down the road, but there are growing pains that come with that to get him there. He has the character to battle through this, learn from it and fight back. He's going to win a lot of games going forward for us. There are going to be hiccups and there are going to be tough nights. The elite athlete will overcome it and we consider him to be an elite athlete."
Oettinger played very well in training camp, handled the decision to send him to the minors with maturity, and then has been very good at home in his call back up to the Stars. He said he doesn't have any specific drills or practice plans that'll address the issues he's dealing with, but added that he simply plans to continue to work hard and fight to get his game back to where it was.
"It's hard," he said after the loss. "I just go to bed tonight and wake up tomorrow and try to move on. Focus like it never happened. It's easier said than done, but the good goalies who stick around for a long time are able to do that. It's the first time that I've gone through something like this at this level, so I'm going to lean on the people around me and work like crazy and make sure the next time I'm in a game, I'm 100% on my game and I'm helping this team win."
Bowness said he expects nothing less from his hard-working goalie.
"The elite athlete will fight through it," Bowness said. "The nature of the beast in being a pro athlete is it's not always going to go your way, and the great ones find a way to fight back and push back and keep getting better and overcome these hiccups, and he will."

Stars keep battling to score goals

Dallas has been pretty good at scoring goals at home and pretty bad on the road, but much of the frustration from Tuesday's 5-3 loss was created by the fact the Stars had 111 shot attempts and could only score three goals.
"We had guys wide open in front of the net four or five times and didn't score," Bowness said. "So the structure got us those opportunities. The pressure got us those opportunities. We just didn't take advantage of it."
It's been a problem for a few seasons now. Dallas was sixth in the league in scoring percentage last season and ranked 18th in scoring at 2.79 goals per game. This year, they're ninth in scoring chances for percentage and are currently 22nd in scoring at 2.78 goals per game.
The Stars have in the past become frustrated by their lack of scoring and that opened up holes in their structure, but Bowness said he didn't believe that happened Tuesday. In fact, he felt the Stars stayed with the game plan and that helped create all the scoring chances.
"It had nothing to do with structure," Bowness said. "It had everything to do with poor puck management at the bluelines, especially their blue line. It cost us three or four goals. That's puck management, that's not structure. That's decisions the player has to make with the puck at the blue line.
"The structure and the pressure we put on them kept us in the game with the number of scoring opportunities that we had and the number of shots we put at the net. One-hundred eleven shot attempts, my gosh, and 30 scoring chances. We had guys wide open in front of the net four or five times and didn't score. The structure got us those opportunities, the pressure got us those opportunities. We just didn't take advantage of them."
This story was not subject to the approval of the National Hockey League or Dallas Stars Hockey Club.
Mike Heikais a Senior Staff Writer for DallasStars.com and has covered the Stars since 1994. Follow him on Twitter @MikeHeika.