First Shift 🏒
The Stars have a big task at hand on Monday, trying to win Game 5 in the best-of-seven series against the Colorado Avalanche. With the series tied at 2-2, Dallas has a huge advantage with two of the remaining three games at home. But the Stars have to take advantage of it.
The Stars in the past two seasons are 5-7 at home in the playoffs. Their scoring average of 2.58 in that span ranks 15th while their goals against average of 3.08 ranks 17th. So finding a way to win at home is key.
"I've said I don't think it's as important until you get to a Game 7 or late into a series like this,” Stars coach Pete DeBoer said. “The fact that it's a 2-out-of-3 and two of the three are in your home building, it becomes important. Especially considering we're a good home team and have been all year. I think it's also nice to have that crowd behind you. It's obvious we're not feeling great about last night and we're coming home, and our home crowd always gets a good boost of energy."
The Stars have only led for 62 seconds so far in the series, but they have found a way to keep the games tight and they have won twice in overtime. That’s part of what has made them a good team under DeBoer. In his three full seasons as head coach, the Stars have the best regular-season record in the league at 149-68-29 (.665 points percentage), rank third in scoring at 3.46 and fifth in goals against at 2.72.
That’s why it’s strange that so far this postseason, they are tied for last in scoring at 1.76 goals per game through four games. It’s also why DeBoer doesn’t seem worried that players like Matt Duchene (0 points, 7 shots on goal), Hintz (1 goal, 13 shots on goal), Mikko Rantanen (1 assist, 12 shots on goal) and Wyatt Johnston (2 assists, 9 shots on goal) haven’t really broken out yet. DeBoer said the ups and downs of playoff series can be vexing, and that Colorado was concerned before its best players carried the mail in Game 4.
"I think everybody is looking for that,” DeBoer said. “I think they got that from their key guys last night. They went to a different level. I expect ours are going to do the same thing here over the next two or three games."
Duchene added, “There’s not a lot going on 5-on-5, so you’ve got to fight for every inch. Hopefully, we can find a way to get hot offensively and get some guys feeling good, but sometimes you’ve just got to grind until that happens.”
The Stars plan on doing just that.
While Game 5 isn’t a must-win, the Stars definitely feel like they should have extra motivation at home.
"Any time you get a lead in a series, there's always a human nature reaction of, ‘We can take a deep breath here and relax a little bit. We’re up in the series,’” DeBoer said. “When you're on the other end of that, like when we were down 1-0, there's a desperation level to your group that amps up. That's why it's very hard to beat a team two or three [games] in a row. Those levels offset each other depending on the situation."
