Heika: What if Stars really can be as good as they sometimes are?

There are times when the Stars can look like the best team in the NHL.
And there are times … well … pretty much not.
The interesting thing about this bunch in Victory Green is they find ways to do it on the same night.

MARK STEPNESKI: [Stars rally from three-goal deficit to stun Ducks]
Take Saturday, for instance. Dallas stumbled around and fell behind the Anaheim Ducks, 3-0. On a night when coach Jim Montgomery was hoping for a statement game following a 7-4 loss to Toronto and two serious days of practice, he got a snooze-button performance from his lads.
The Stars didn't win puck battles. They didn't clear the front of the net. They didn't play smart. While they had an advantage in shots on goal and in scoring chances, they earned their three-goal deficit.

And that was a bit disheartening.
"We had a bad start, we took some bad penalties, myself included," said Alexander Radulov, who had that same problem last year and was hoping to fix it. "We've got to find a way to start a game as soon as the puck drops."
Because if they do, then the potential is there for something special.
The Stars exited the first period down 2-0 and did some adjusting both in strategy and attitude en route to a 5-3 win over the Ducks. Montgomery, who shuffled his lines and defensive pairs to start the game, shuffled them again.
He put Blake Comeau with Jamie Benn and Tyler Seguin, and the edgy winger fit well. He put Devin Shore back on a wing with Jason Dickinson and Brett Ritchie and liked the energy. He put Mattias Janmark on a line with Radek Faksa and Tyler Pitlick, and they were fantastic as a shutdown trio all the way into the third period. And he put Radulov with Jason Spezza and Val Nichushkin, and watched the two wingers from Russia find moments of pure chemistry.

"I think it put a little desperation in us. I wanted Radulov to get Nichushkin going. I thought Spezza would be a good center with them," Montgomery said. "And we moved Janmark to left wing (with Faksa) and I really liked that line. I thought this was Janmark's best game."
All of that is important because Montgomery is a rookie NHL head coach. He's making some pretty important decisions, and positive feedback is going to be better than negative feedback at this point. He made some risky moves, going with Anton Khudobin in net, playing Julius Honka in his season debut on defense, and choosing Dickinson over Roope Hintz.
He had logical reasons for each decision, but if that logic backfired, he questions it and we question it.
The questions are minimal after this game. Montgomery has been scratching an itch on Radulov and Nichushkin, and it paid off. He's been trying to find a match for Spezza, and it paid off. He rolled the dice on Janmark and Faksa, and it paid off. That's a lot of ROI for one game.
And one game where it didn't go according to Hoyle.

But that's what makes Saturday so wonderful. Because amid all the challenges, the Stars stepped up and played one of their best periods ever.
That's right, ever.
They outshot the Ducks 30-4. They dominated pretty much every aspect of the game and they grabbed a 4-3 lead on the strength of a run where they scored three goals in two minutes, 47 seconds.
If that sounds familiar, it's because they scored three goals in 96 seconds in the season opener. They really dohave the potential to, at times, become the most explosive team in the NHL.
"We do have that ability. We proved it already," said Khudobin. "I think we just need to start playing like this all 60 minutes. That would be better."

It would indeed. And maybe they can. They are four games into a new year with a new coach and they're 3-1-0. They have yet to see building-block defenseman Stephen Johns (neck/headache issues) for one game, and they have been shuffling blueline pairs with a 19-year-old rookie (Miro Heiskanen) and a guy who got here two days before the opener (Connor Carrick).
So you can see why they have had troubles clearing the front of the net at times. You can see why they're not the best at killing penalties. You can see why they're not quite consistent yet in their performance.
But you can also see the potential.
What happens if they dofind the right lines? What happens if the new guys get better? What happens if they canduplicate the second period (or come close to it) for 30 or 40 or 50 minutes?
What happens if they are a lot more so than not?

"You can't make the playoffs the first 20 games, but you certainly can make it really difficult in the NHL if you don't keep pace," said Carrick, who tallied a goal to go now with three assists in the first three games.
"We want to establish ourselves with some of the marquee teams in the league, and it's going to take more than a four-game effort. But to go three and one … if you're taking four game chunks and go three and one, you look pretty good after 82."
So as the team heads off on its first road trip -- a quick back-to-back jaunt to Ottawa and New Jersey on Monday and Tuesday -- it does so with a lovely fragrance of "what if" wafting in the air.
What if they can be as good as they sometimes are?
"It's a lot to build off of," Carrick said. "We'll go on the road against some good hockey clubs, and then see what we have after 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 Twitter @MikeHeika,and listen to his podcast.