Stars goalie for Game 6 of Western Second Round against Avalanche debated

Who will be the starting goalie for the Dallas Stars against the Colorado Avalanche in Game 6 of the Western Conference Second Round at Rogers Place in Edmonton on Wednesday (8 p.m. ET; NBCSN, CBC, SN, TVAS) with the Stars one win from advancing to the Western Conference Final?

Will it be Ben Bishop, the No. 1 goalie during the regular season? Or will it be backup Anton Khudobin, who has won seven of 11 starts this postseason?
Bishop, playing his first game since Aug. 13, Game 2 of the first round against the Calgary Flames, allowed four goals on 19 shots (.789 save percentage) in the first 13:43 of Game 5, a 6-3 loss Monday in Edmonton, the West hub city, that kept the Avalanche alive in the best-of-7 series. Khudobin replaced Bishop and made the save on 20 of 22 shots.
Khudobin has a 2.86 goals-against average and a .911 save percentage this postseason. He was 16-8-4 with a 2.22 GAA and .930 save percentage in 30 games during the regular season.
Bishop, the runner-up to Andrei Vasilevskiy of the Tampa Bay Lightning for the 2019 Vezina Trophy, awarded to goalie voted best in the NHL, was 21-16-4 this season with a 2.50 GAA and .920 save percentage.
Dallas coach Rick Bowness must decide whether Bishop or Khudobin is the best option in Game 6 to win the series. The Stars have not been to the conference final since 2008.
NHL.com polled four of its writers to see if they could come to a consensus on whether it should be Bishop or Khudobin.
Here are their thoughts:

Dan Rosen, senior writer

With respect to Bishop, this is Khudobin's series to win or lose. I respect and understand Bowness' reasoning for starting Bishop in Game 5. Bowness said Bishop came to him and said he was ready. When the No. 1 goalie says that, you believe and trust him. It was a back-to-back situation and Bowness said their preference is to not start a goalie in both games. Khudobin started Sunday, so it was reasonable to start Bishop. But it didn't work out. He gave up four goals on 19 shots in 13:43. The play in front of him was not good, but Bishop admitted he had to be better. He's right. Now the Stars have to return to Khudobin for Game 6. He started the first four games of the series and was good enough to win three of them. He made 20 saves in relief of Bishop in Game 5. It's possible that the Stars could go back to Bishop in the conference final, but Khudobin deserves to be the goalie who gets them there.

Pete Jensen, senior fantasy editor

Bishop is one of the top five goalies in the League when he's healthy and in his groove, but the way he, and the defense in front of him, played in Game 5 was a big momentum shift in the wrong direction. There's still a strong case to start Bishop, if he's fit to play, in Game 6 based on his postseason track record (29 wins, .924 save percentage in 50 decisions), but sometimes you have to simply trust the goalie who got you this far. Khudobin, who had a .930 save percentage in the regular season, faced plenty of adversity in the series against the Flames but responded each time when Dallas won in six games. He has rarely failed the Stars this season, and it's probably not a coincidence that they have played their best offensive hockey in front of him. Khudobin has made the timely saves to keep Dallas within striking distance in each of his starts this series and deserves to start Game 6 against the Avalanche. With Bishop missing so much time this postseason, the Stars wouldn't be where they are without Khudobin.

Tracey Myers, staff writer

Yeah, let's make it a clean sweep: Khudobin, Khudobin, Khudobin. Bishop is tremendous when he's in a rhythm and when he's healthy. He may have his health and he may have told his coach he was ready to go again. But as any goaltender -- or forward or defenseman, for that matter -- will say, there's a big difference between practice and games in terms of speed of play, bounces of the puck and crease-front traffic. As Bowness said, the Stars could have played much, much better in front of Bishop. But I still wonder if Bishop was ready for a return. Nothing in this series has been easy, and with the way the teams have traded goals, no lead has been safe. But the Stars did enough to take a 3-1 lead and there was no need to change things unless Khudobin's game started costing them.

Shawn P. Roarke, Senior Director of Editorial

Let's go easy with the clean sweep talk here. Tracey, you should know me well enough by now to know I revel in the art of dissention. And I'll take the bait here again, leaning heavily into the unpopular opinion that Bishop should be the starter Wednesday. There's a reason Khudobin has been the backup, and a good one at that, since he arrived in Dallas last season. Simply, he is not as good as Bishop, who has finished in the top three of Vezina voting three times. Khudobin has rarely handled the workload he has been asked to shoulder in the postseason and, despite the wins, has not exactly set the world on fire. He has faced an average of 32.7 shots in his 11 postseason starts and has a save percentage under .910 in six of them, so to me, it's simple. Roll the dice with your No. 1 in Game 6 and go to a rested Khudobin if a Game 7 is required.