The beginning of this Dallas Stars season has been really refreshing to Stars fans all over the globe. The ultra stressful “defense first” hockey has been kicked to the curb in favor of a top 5 offense in the NHL and a share of the lead in the central division.
How good are the stars really doing so far? More importantly, will this early success transfer to winning in the playoffs?
The Stars Record vs. Playoff teams is Abysmal
The Stars record against teams that are currently in the playoffs as of 12/13 is 4-6-5.
The first thing that sticks out to me is the OT loses. If just a few of those are flipped then this record doesn’t look too bad. On top of that, overtime in the postseason is a whole different ball game than overtime in the regular season. That makes it hard to tell if regular season overtime struggles will lead to postseason overtime struggles as well.
On the positive side, the Stars are really taking care of business against their lesser opponents. They have a record of 12-2-0 against teams out of the playoff picture. Most of these games have been very one sided as well. Our goal differential in those 14 games is +32.
Dallas Stars . . . WHAT HAPPEENNNDDUUHH???
So what's going on in these games against better teams? Are the Stars just perfectly in the middle of the road?
The Stars are struggling to score the same way against these better teams. In about two thirds of these losses to playoff teams they are held to 2 or fewer goals. For a Stars team that relies on lots of offensive production, that is a killer.
There have only been 2 games this season where the Stars scored more than 2 goals and failed to collect a point. The magic number is 3.
They need to find a way to create offense against teams who have a better and more structured defense.
Can anyone else score?
So far the majority of the goals scored this year have been beauties. Sick little passes to the slot followed up by quick wicked wristers. Plays that will make the end of year highlight video. What we have not seen enough of this year is the grimy, hard working goals around the crease.
The depth of the Stars roster is where these greasy goals need to come from. There have only been 13 goals scored by Stars players not named Robertson, Hintz, or Pavelski in the Stars 13 losses this season. In contrast, those same players have a total of 47 goals in the Stars 16 wins.
The depth of this team is not pulling their weight in these big games against good teams. What the numbers do not show is that this problem is getting worse not better. The majority of depth goals in our losses came at the beginning of the season.
Wrap it up
The Stars are not doing good enough against playoff teams. These losses are coming when they do not get at least 3 goals in the game. These goals are disappearing from our depth players. It is imperative that our depth players find a way to execute in the goal column for us to start winning the marquee matchups.
Special thanks to Kristopher Jones!
