Heika’s Take: Stars get confidence boost in blowout win over Blackhawks

It was a small step for the Stars’ power play, but possibly a giant leap for the entire Dallas organization.

Taking advantage of a five-minute major in the second period, the lads in Victory Green scored their first power play goal in five games and then built on that for an eventual 5-1 win over the Chicago Blackhawks at United Center on Sunday. Dallas saw a similar five-minute major get wasted last week in a 3-1 loss to the Rangers, so there were some fresh memories in this one.

“I think the whole power play gets a jump off of it and then 5-on-5 starts to build off of it,” said Jason Robertson, who scored the goal. “It goes a long way.”

The power play has been an area of concern all season and currently ranks 27th at 15.4 percent. It has let the team down in losses to the Wild, Rangers and Maple Leafs in the last two weeks alone. In addition, the continued frustration was mounting for players like Robertson, Wyatt Johnston and Logan Stankoven (who are far below their expected production). So when the team took advantage of Tyler Bertuzzi’s five-minute major for elbowing Colin Blackwell in the face, the feeling was quite satisfying.

Dallas didn’t score again on that major, but it had an urgency on the man advantage that hadn’t been there. Two different units were flying around and creating opportunities, and that carried over. About a minute after the major penalty expired, Matt Duchene found Evgenii Dadonov in transition for his 10th goal of the season, and that allowed the Stars to stretch a lead, something that had been an issue in recent games.

“It was huge,” said captain Jamie Benn. “We got one on the power play to take the lead and then Dutch made a great pass to Daddy to go up two, and we kind of rolled from there.”

Duchene and Benn each finished with a goal and two assists. Robertson, Dadonov and Johnston each had a goal and an assist. That was important, as coach Pete DeBoer shuffled the lines in hopes of finding a spark. Mason Marchment is out for a while after getting hit in the face with a puck on Friday against Minnesota, so the realignment was forced. But the fact that the coaching staff moved Johnston and Benn to a line with Duchene, assembled an “AHL” line of Mavrik Bourque and Stankoven with Oskar Bäck, and put Dadonov with Roope Hintz and Robertson ended up being crucial. Those three lines showed flashes of promising chemistry, and the fourth line with Blackwell, Sam Steel and rookie Justin Hryckowian was solid as well.

Hryckowian logged just six minutes because of the extensive special teams play, but the Stars as a whole appeared to have continuity in a difficult situation. Dallas was 1-for-7 in 15 minutes on the power play and put 17 man advantage shots on net. That was similar to the Rangers game, which was seen as a disappointment, but this felt better.

“It’s got to start somewhere,” said DeBoer. “It started with one tonight and it’s on us to build on that.”

Dallas finished with a 35-25 advantage in shots on goal and had a 63-44 edge in shot attempts. It once again had more than 30 scoring chances and won the faceoff battle 31-22. Those are all details that could help this team find consistency and get on a roll, but, as DeBoer said, they have to go out and do it.

The Stars are now 21-13-1, good for 43 points. That puts them at .614 points percentage, which ranks sixth in the West. That’s not ideal, as it puts them in the mushy middle, too close to the playoff cutoff, but it is a similar standing to what they had last season when the calendar turned.

“Hopefully, we can get on a run like we did last year,” said Robertson.

The 25-year-old forward would love to lead the way in that department. He now has eight goals in 35 games after averaging 39 goals across the three previous seasons. Robertson had foot surgery in the summer and that affected his training. He has been trying to find his stride, and said it might be getting close.

“It’s been a long time, but you still don’t feel good when you don’t have an offseason,” Robertson said. “You’re trying to adapt and then you’re trying to play catch-up, and then you’re trying to forget about the catching up and trying to focus on the new page.”

Robertson said now he’s hoping to get back to “normal.”

“I think December has been trending in the right direction,” he said. “I’m definitely feeling better 35 games in and it’s exciting because we have a whole new year.”

Dallas will play host to Buffalo on New Year’s Eve and then get a couple more home games before setting out on the longest road trip of the season. But getting a win in Chicago against a struggling Blackhawks team was important, simply for the confidence factor.

“It was an important win for us,” DeBoer said. “We got some goals, and the right guys scored some goals. We got a power play goal, Jake [Oettinger] was good in net, there were some good things. Now, we’ve got to build on that.”

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.