Heika’s Take: Stars pick up valuable point in airtight divisional battle with Wild

You win some…you lose some.

Well, in the NHL, you lose some and still gain a consolation point in the standings, making the 82-game journey all the more confusing.

Dallas probably didn’t deserve the extra point on Wednesday in a shootout win at Colorado. The Stars probably did Saturday in an overtime loss at Minnesota. The end result is they played two very challenging road games against two very good teams and walked away with three out of four points. That should be seen as pretty good.

And for coach Glen Gulutzan, it really was.

“It was a good game,” Gulutzan said after a 2-1 OT loss against the Wild. “Of course you want all four points, but this is probably the way it ends up. We got three out of four points, and it’s tight. Everybody talks about the Central, and this is what it is.”

Dallas is now 43-15-11 for 97 points. Colorado is 45-13-10 for 100 points. And Minnesota is 40-19-12 for 92 points. Those three teams are in the top five in the NHL overall, and yet they will have to play each other in the first two rounds of the playoffs because of the NHL’s division-centric format. That’s why this week was pretty important for the Stars.

The win on Wednesday brought them closer to the Avalanche and the possibility of earning the top seed in the Central and playing a wildcard team in the First Round. The game on Saturday allowed Minnesota to draw a little bit closer in the standings and possibly earn home ice in the First Round if it ends up playing Dallas.

And there was a real buzz about that in both buildings.

“You can feel the intensity pick up, every decision matters a little bit more,” said rookie Justin Hryckowian, who logged 15:09 and took 10 faceoffs. “This is the best time of the year and we’re all gearing up for it.”

Minnesota started strong, but Dallas pushed back and took a 1-0 lead on a Jason Robertson power play goal in the first period. Minnesota pushed back in the second and tied it up on a nice pass from Quinn Hughes that sprung Bobby Brink on a breakaway.

The two teams then exchanged some fantastic scoring chances that were stopped by Stars goalie Jake Oettinger and his Minnesota counterpart Filip Gustavsson. Oettinger finished with 26 saves and Gustavsson with 28, including 10 in the third period when Dallas had six minutes of power play time.

That late failure with the game on the line was part of the bad feeling that stuck with the Stars afterward. Robertson scored on the man advantage and Dallas created several good chances that could have been the difference, but instead the power play couldn’t rescue the game.

“You’re not going to score every time,” Gulutzan said. “But as long as you’re getting chances. We had some Grade-A, Grade-A, Grade-A there. I liked the way we moved it around.”

In overtime, the Stars again did some good things as they possessed the puck early and played in the Minnesota end. But when they had a breakdown, the defense got scrambled and Vladimir Tarasenko sat wide open in front of Oettinger to win the game at the 3:05 mark of the extra frame.

It was a good play by the Wild, a couple of mistakes by the Stars, and a lesson to be learned before the race continues Sunday at American Airlines Center against Vegas.

“Another good team, another team with history,” said Robertson of the Golden Knights. “Guys are going to get home at a good time, probably go to sleep at a good time and have that energy up for tomorrow.”

Because the battle for points in a fierce division is only going to get more intense as the end of the season nears.

“I think it’s a good thing to play important games late in the year,” said captain Jamie Benn. “We’ve got a pretty good feel for Colorado and Minnesota right now. It’s like in the playoffs, there’s going to be momentum swings and you try to handle that as a group. You saw that a little bit tonight and there are things we can learn from it.

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.