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Greg Wyszynski, ESPN
DALLAS — Like most Dallas Stars players, Matt Duchene is looking to win his first Stanley Cup, but after Friday night’s Game 5 loss to the Edmonton Oilers, he’s looking for a reason why the conference’s top seed is one loss away from being eliminated.
“We weren’t at our best except in Game 3,” the coach said after the Oilers won 3-1 to take a 3-2 lead in the Western Conference finals. “We were a little inconsistent offensively throughout this series.”
The Stars averaged 3.59 goals per game during the regular season, and have scored two or fewer goals in each of their three series losses.
Forward Tyler Seguin said the Stars didn’t “work together” as a five-man unit on the ice, Duchene said they didn’t recover enough pucks in the offensive zone and, when they did, Dallas was too hesitant to take on scoring chances against Edmonton goaltender Stuart Skinner (19 saves).
“When you want something so badly, it’s easy to try to be too perfect. We have to believe in how we’re playing,” Duchene said.
The Oilers, coming off a two-game winning streak, controlled much of the game, holding the Stars to just four shots in the first period and not allowing Dallas a single shot on goal for 9 minutes, 43 seconds in the second.
Asked about a second period that one report called “lackluster,” Dallas coach Peter DeBoer said the description was an attack on his team’s character.
“If you want, you can sit here and ask us questions about our personalities, but you know what, I’m not going to do that. You can write whatever you want,” DeBoer said.
The coach said Edmonton shut down his team and played a “perfect away game.”
“If you’re going to get a draw on the road, that’s the way you want it to go,” DeBoer said. “They want to get a lead early in the game with two power-play goals and then they want to be defensive the whole time, so it’s tough to get through.”
Oilers forward Ryan Nugent-Hopkins, who scored two power-play goals, said the key to defending the Stars was making mistakes and not giving the opposition any chances.
“It starts with getting through the neutral zone, not turning the puck over and not letting them get easy opportunities,” Nugent-Hopkins said. “Sometimes you’ve got to survive to get back in. You don’t have to be too aggressive.”
“When you want something so badly, it’s easy to try to be too perfect. We have to trust our play.”
Matt Duchene
Nugent-Hopkins was also on the Edmonton penalty kill and hasn’t allowed Dallas a power-play goal all series. The Stars were 0-for-11, with five of those coming on the power play in Game 1.
“We didn’t have a lot of power plays in this series. So, part of it is [lack of success] “Again, there’s no excuses at this time of year. Sometimes special teams have to win games and that’s what we did tonight,” Seguin said.
The Oilers return home with a chance to reach the Stanley Cup Final for the first time since 2006, but the Stars believe they can bounce back. Dallas had their best record on the road in the regular season and is 6-2 on the road in the playoffs. What’s more, the Stars believe Edmonton has yet to play its best.
“We feel confident that if we play our best, we can beat anybody, so it’s just a matter of playing our best in the next game,” said forward Wyatt Johnston, who scored his 10th playoff goal in the loss. “We can’t afford to lose any more series. We’re definitely in a tight spot.”
