After two games on the grounds of the Vegas Golden Knights, the Dallas Stars return home down 2-0 in the Western Conference Finals series.
Faces were long in the Texas camp on Sunday night, after a 3-2 overtime loss. It was the second time in as many games against the Nevada club that the Stars lost in overtime. The team is now 0-4 in overtime since the start of this playoff.
“It’s not an easy loss to digest,” admitted forward Jason Robertson, whose comments were reported by the National League website.
“We made two mistakes and they took advantage of them. It’s a good team on the other side, these guys are going to take advantage of their chances. We have to regroup and stick to our style of play. That’s not what we did in overtime.
Head coach Peter DeBoer decided to see the glass half full.
“It’s part of the playoff adventure. Teams that go far find ways to win in overtime, the driver said. I really liked the way we played tonight [dimanche]. We did several good things and fixed several broken things in the first game. We got better chances than them in overtime. We just have to find a way to get the puck in the net.”
“If we play this way, we’ll have a chance to win when we get home,” added DeBoer.
Not an excuse
The Stars coach, however, insisted that an overtime loss did not represent a moral victory, quite the contrary.
“I don’t think it’s any less worrying because we lost both games in overtime,” he said.
“We could have won the first two games. They took advantage of being home and now we have to do the same.”
Since the start of the 2023 Spring Dance on the Bettman Tour, the Stars have maintained a record of five wins and two losses when playing in front of their fans at American Airlines Center.
– The third game of the series will be played on Tuesday evening and broadcast on TVA Sports at 8 p.m.