The Dallas Stars can now put a win beside the two losses that opened their season. That is a small administrative improvement, but hockey standings have never been impressed by a beautifully explained defeat.
Monday’s 5-0 victory over the San Jose Sharks at American Airlines Center moved Dallas to 1-2-0. It gave the Stars an actual result to build around: five different scorers, a 26-13 advantage in shots on goal and a shutout for Jake Oettinger. The record remains unfavorable. The latest entry gives Dallas something better to discuss than the record alone.
The tempting response is to treat a five-goal margin as a sweeping correction. That would give one game more authority than it deserves. Dallas scored on five of its 26 shots, an excellent conversion night, and went 0-for-3 on the power play. Those facts can live together. The attack finished very well in ordinary play while leaving its extra-man opportunities unused.
What Dallas can reasonably take from the game begins with the workload it imposed at opposite ends. San Jose managed two first-period shots and five in the second. The Stars had 11 and nine.
By the time the third period began, Dallas led 4-0 and had put 20 shots on net against seven for the Sharks. That is a substantial advantage even before the finishing is celebrated.
Oettinger stopped all 13 shots, including three from San Jose’s power play. A shutout should always credit the goalie for completing the assignment. This one also credits the teammates who kept the assignment relatively small. Dallas did not need an enormous save total to obtain its first win; it needed Oettinger to handle the shots that remained after a limited opposing attack.
The order of the scoring made the shot advantage useful. Miro Heiskanen’s backhand at 18:51 of the first period supplied a lead before intermission. The second period then produced goals from Joel Kiviranta, Jamie Benn and Jason Robertson, turning a one-goal game into a four-goal one.
Mikko Rantanen added the fifth in the third. Dallas received enough finishing from enough players to avoid resting the result on one scorer.
That sequence is especially valuable as a description of Monday, because the first-period volume had not immediately brought scoring. Dallas spent most of the period without a goal. Once Heiskanen supplied it, the next period widened the margin rather than simply asking the goaltender to defend the smallest possible lead. The result became comfortable through additional offense.
There is still a difference between describing that success and explaining the entire opening stretch. The Stars have played three games. One shutout cannot erase the two previous losses, and a list of Monday’s productive players cannot establish that the lineup has found its permanent answer.
