Despite being hit in the right arm by a powerful shot from the point, Roope Hintz soon after sent the puck into an empty net, sealing a 4-2 victory for the Dallas Stars over the Vegas Golden Knights on Monday night.
“That’s how you win championships,” Dallas goalie Jake Oettinger said.
The Stars have shown resilience, bouncing back from losing the first two games of their first-round NHL playoff series at home by beating the defending champions twice in Las Vegas.
Game 5 is set for Wednesday night in Dallas.
Evgenii Dadonov, Wyatt Johnston, and Ty Dellandrea also scored for the Stars, while Oettinger made 33 saves. Johnston has had three goals in the past two games, including being the Game 3 winner in overtime.
Michael Amadio and Jack Eichel scored for the Golden Knights, and Logan Thompson stopped 28 shots. Eichel has scored in three consecutive games, totaling six points in this series.
Both teams benefited from first-period goals that the goalies likely wish they could have back.
Amadio squeezed a rebound past Oettinger with 5:35 left, and 2 1/2 minutes later, Dadonov scored from the goal line when the puck deflected off Thompson’s mask into the net. The Knights outshot the Stars 14-8 in the period.
That changed in the second when the Stars outshot Vegas 17-6 and scored twice to take a 3-2 lead.
Eichel scored off a rebound 3:09 into the period, and Johnston added a power-play goal off a rebound midway through the period to tie it. The Stars got a bit of good luck when Craig Smith’s shot went off Dellandrea’s chest and into the net with 1:26 left.
Knights coach Bruce Cassidy called Dellandrea’s goal “inexcusable.”
“We can get out of the period 2-2,” Cassidy said. “We stayed too long in the shift. Then we mismanaged the puck. It’s a fortunate play, but they’re putting everything to the net. You’re going to get some of those bounces.”
Dellandrea had scored two third-period goals in Game 5 of last year’s Western Conference final to keep the Stars’ playoff hopes alive.
“He likes playing in Vegas,” Stars coach Pete DeBoer said. “He’s a playoff-type player. He doesn’t shrink in the room.”
Content with the lead, the Stars adopted a defensive strategy in the third period, mirroring Vegas’ approach from the first two games. Despite being outshot 15-7 in the third, the Stars consistently broke up scoring chances and forced the Knights into difficult shots.
“I thought in the second period we really took control of the game,” DeBoer said. “The play in the third period was just locked it down. You don’t like to sit back that much, but I felt like we were smart like they were in Dallas when they had the lead going into the third.”
Dallas ended any doubts when Hintz buried the empty-netter with 1:22 left.
The Stars have shown they won’t be an easy out. They came to Las Vegas down 2-0 and, in Game 4 twice, had to rally.
“There’s no panic in our game,” Stars captain Jamie Benn said. “You knew they were going to come out hard. They’re a good team. We weathered the storm and found a way to win.”
Benn appeared in his 87th playoff game as the Stars’ captain, the most in franchise history. Derian Hatcher, captain of the 1999 Stanley Cup championship team, played in 86 games.
