“Credit to the team, we were able to put it behind us”. We’ll add you to our fan video.
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But as the opening period wore on it became more and more the Stars’ kind of game – only slightly controlled chaos, trading chances and, eventually, Dallas produced the equalizer by defenceman Alex Goligoski, sliding into the slot to take Vern Fiddler’s pass and fire it over Elliott’s glove. T.J. Oshie also scored on the power play and Justin Williams at even strength, cracking Matt Murray after the goaltender looked superhuman for most of the series.
While the Stars would continue piecing together moments of effort and partially controlling the flow of the game, the Blues would get goals from Dmitrij Jaskin, Troy Brouwer, and an empty netter from Paul Stastny to seal the 4-1 victory, clinching a third win in the series for St. Louis. I think we felt that the last series too.
“We had a gutsy effort in Game 4”, Benn said. Instead, they failed to take advantage of opportunities and allowed Dallas to sneak out of town with a 3-2 overtime win.
“He’s been a big part of our team”, Spezza said. “We’re excited to be going home. We had to get it turned around the other way”. The Stars coughed the puck up in the St. Louis zone and Jaden Schwartz found a streaking Tarasenko, who fired the puck through Kari Lehotnen’s five hole for the lead.
“They’ve got home-ice advantage again”. Now they face elimination in St. Louis on Monday.
“Any time you get a chance to clinch, it’s huge”, Elliott said.
“Once you get backed into a corner, in brings out the best of you in a lot of ways”, Oduya said.
Dallas didn’t do enough of that in Game 5, and now their season is on the brink. At this point in the first round against Minnesota, Dallas had scored 16 goals; it has 10 against St. Louis, nine of which have come at even strength.
A much improved effort in their own end that saw far fewer turnovers and a bigger physical presence, registering 30 hits was key to the Game 4 win, and I don’t see Lindy Ruff changing much over the next 2 days. “I know Patty, and he’s a tough guy and he’ll play if he thinks he can play”. “Just comes across, makes himself big, stops the puck”.
St. Louis could insert veteran defenseman Robert Bortuzzo into the lineup for rookie Joel Edmundson, who had a costly giveaway that led to a Dallas goal Thursday.
The symmetry of the game – two goals on awful errors, two goals on the power play, a 2-2 score (until OT, of course) – was indicative of the balance between the two teams. From that point on, both goalies were ideal…until Eakin’s game-winning goal.
The referees in game five were by no means flawless.
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With the series so neck-and-neck, the National Hockey League announced start times for Game 6 and Game 7 (if necessary) on Friday.
