ST. PAUL. Minn. — The insolent puck just sat there, about a foot outside of the Dallas Stars crease, taunting the three men converging on it midway through the third period of a one-goal game. Dallas goaltender Jake Oettinger had been pulled too far to his left by the two-on-one he had just stopped. He lunged for the puck, but it was out of reach. The Minnesota Wild’s Matt Boldy, who had just tucked it into Oettinger’s pads on the rebound of that two-on-one, desperately reached back for it, trying to will it into the yawning net, but merely waved the blade of his stick over it, tantalizingly close to a shorthanded goal that would have all but iced the game.
And then there was Dallas forward Matt Duchene, who had looked on helplessly as the two-on-one materialized beyond his reach. Duchene missed his first chance to tie up Boldy, overskating his way into the crease. And there sat the puck. For a moment. For an eternity.
“Your heart goes in your throat for a second,” Duchene said. “It’s a ‘holy s—‘ moment.”
Just one of many on this fast, physical, furious night that didn’t end until morning.
Duchene finally did clear that puck, beating Boldy to it by a whisper. Fifty-nine seconds later, he scored at the other end of the ice, burying a Mikko Rantanen feed for a game-tying power-play goal. Ah, but the night was only beginning. And the hearts of the Stars, the Wild and the 19,244 raucous fans at Grand Casino Arena didn’t leave their throats until a few ticks before 1 a.m. CT, when Wyatt Johnston — making himself at home in Joe Pavelski’s old office — tipped in a Miro Heiskanen shot for a power-play goal at 12:10 of the second overtime, giving the Stars a 4-3 win and a 2-1 lead in a marquee first-round series that’s really starting to live up to the hype.
The whole affair was a gloriously agonizing exercise, as only the Stanley Cup playoffs can be. Duchene said he had his head down and was squinting out of one eye, barely able to look, as Radek Faksa killed off about a minute of a penalty late in the first overtime after his stick shattered blocking a shot. Faksa had to summon all his mental strength not to panic when that stick broke, with the bench and fresh lumber seemingly miles away. Dallas coach Glen Gulutzan might have looked calm, never a hair out of place, but he said he felt the full weight of the moment throughout — the stress of each penalty kill, the breath-catch on every shot against, the angst of every missed scoring chance. And during the two overtime intermissions, Jason Robertson didn’t even know what he was eating or drinking but surely could have used a bit of citrus.
Heck, even in the visitors locker room after the game, players were still trying to figure out what happened. Injured Tyler Seguin and some of the scratches and Black Aces were in one corner of the room, asking who actually scored the game-winner.
“It’s crazy,” Robertson said, sweat still streaming down his face. “We’re playing at 1 o’clock. These 8:50 games are tough.”
The Stars: They’re just like us.
It’s all laughs and smiles now, of course. Now that it’s over. Now that the Stars won. But had they lost, had the penalty kill not valiantly staved off three Wild power plays in the third period and another two in overtime, had Boldy buried one of his 10 shot attempts, had Kirill Kaprizov hit the net instead of the post late in the first overtime, had any number of tiny moments like that loose puck in Oettinger’s crease gone the other way, the Stars would be where the Wild are now — trailing the series and kicking themselves.
A blown 2-0 lead. Another spate of inexcusable offensive-zone penalties. Four players — Jamie Benn. Lian Bichsel, Tyler Myers and Sam Steel — burned by Boldy on one spectacular play that set up a Joel Eriksson Ek goal. Faksa sending a puck through the crease behind Jesper Wallstedt in the second overtime. There were so many chances for Dallas to lose this game, to lose control of the series.
But their special teams wouldn’t allow it. The penalty kill kept them alive, and the power play put it away. It’s rare for special teams to factor in so greatly in overtime, but in a heavy and heavily officiated game that still somehow left both teams fuming about missed calls (Dallas had eight power plays, Minnesota seven), both teams had two power plays after regulation. Dallas killed both and Minnesota could only kill one, with Danila Yurov’s delay of game for sending the puck into the crowd proving devastatingly costly.
Dallas is loaded with high-end players, and its big three — Rantanen, Robertson and Johnston — each scored. But it was Heiskanen, Esa Lindell and the unsung scrappy penalty-killing forwards like Faksa, rookie Arttu Hyry and Oskar Bäck, who were the heroes of Game 3.
“Listen, we go out there on the power play, it’s stressful minutes, but it’s not nearly as stressful as the PKers,” said Robertson, who has scored in all three games of the series. “They’re trying to get the job done, keep it out. (When) we’re out there, it’s a big difference. You can’t say (enough) about the PKers tonight, especially when we were taking on water in the first overtime. … For us power-play guys, we’re happy that we could reward them.”
The winner was quintessential Johnston, the 45-goal scorer and heir apparent to former Stars great Pavelski as the league’s top tipper. Heiskanen ripped a wrist shot from up top into traffic, where it caught a piece of Minnesota’s Marcus Foligno and redirected right toward Johnston. The 22-year-old Stars center stood tall in the low slot with his face to Heiskanen and his back to Wallstedt and the two Wild defenders — Jonas Brodin and Jared Spurgeon — screening him. Johnston timed it perfectly, adjusting to the initial deflection off Foligno and knocking the rising puck down and to the outside with the lower shaft of his stick, sending it just past Wallstedt’s outstretched glove.
The Stars on the ice didn’t even know who scored, just that it went in. That was enough to trigger a massive celebration and silence a spectacularly rambunctious crowd. Gulutzan was finally able to breathe.
“The farther you get away from the ice, the more stressful it gets,” he said. “It’s way better to be a player. I was thinking that when I was walking in today — ‘Man, I wish I was playing rather than coaching,’ because the stress levels are different.”
Dallas finished 3-for-8 on the power play. Minnesota finished 1-for-7. For all the twists and turns and collisions and skirmishes, that was the only stat that mattered.
“It’s important to capitalize when you get those chances,” Johnston said. “Great to get that one. Just trying to pitch in, do what I can to help. It’s nice that it went in.”
With two days off before Saturday’s Game 4, there’ll be time to dissect everything that went down on Wednesday night and early Thursday morning. There’ll be Zapruder-like breakdowns on Benn’s leaping forearm to the back of Boldy’s head that briefly knocked him out of the game. On Duchene’s tussle with Foligno, when an awkward moment ended with Duchene falling on his friend and slamming his face to the ice (“I got to wear his blood on my jersey the rest of the game,” Duchene quipped). On Johnston spearing Kaprizov in a sensitive area after Kaprizov took a swipe at Oettinger’s glove. On missed calls going both ways. On Rantanen taking yet another stick penalty, his fifth of the series. On the Wild seemingly figuring out that they can beat Oettinger with some consistency if they shoot blocker side.
And maybe we’ll eventually find out if Foligno was right when he said the Stars couldn’t “hang” with the Wild at five-on-five. They’ll have to actually play some five-on-five before we know for sure.
But on this night — no, on this morning — the music was blaring in the visitors room, not the home room. The Stars won, the Wild lost. Whether it’s a 6-1 rout or a twisty, violent, exhilarating and exhausting four-plus hour marathon, they all count the same. And there’s so much more hockey to play for these two teams, two of the league’s very best. The difference between them is as thin as the line between Boldy finding that puck and ending the game, and Duchene finding that puck and saving the game.
We certainly don’t know yet which team is actually better. But we do know one thing: It’ll all feel like an overtime penalty kill from here — stressful as all hell, in the way that all great playoff series are.
“Survive,” Robertson said. “Just survive.”