DALLAS — Across the last three months of the Dallas Stars season, expect to hear a lot about playoff hockey.
The presence of it during regular-season games. The hope of participating in it in May. And how the Stars have to treat each game as such because of their uneven first half that put them on the outside of the Western Conference postseason picture.
Two games since the All-Star break, the hockey has matched the rhetoric.
In a 4-3 overtime win over Winnipeg on Friday night, the Stars and Jets tangled in a hard-hitting and testy game that reflected each team’s place in the Central Division standings. Friday’s game piggybacked off of Wednesday’s contentious battle with rival Nashville that left each side bruised.
Jason Robertson scored the game-winning goal for Dallas with 1:50 left in overtime.
The game reached extra time after Mark Scheifele ripped a slap shot past Jake Oettinger with 31.9 seconds left in the third period as Winnipeg had the extra attacker on the ice.
Dallas, which has now won three of its last four games, the only blemish a pre-break, third-period collapse against the Flames.
Captain Jamie Benn, Tyler Seguin and Jacob Peterson also scored for the Stars, while Winnipeg received goals from Pierre-Luc Dubois, Jansen Harkins and Scheifele.
“Now it’s the playoff push, this is when hockey is the most fun,” Seguin said before the game. “There’s a comfort in the uncomfortable that we’ve been through, if that makes sense. We’ve been that, if you want to call it, Cinderella team in different ways over the years.”
The Jets and Stars completed an entertaining second period that featured four goals, a fight between Benn and former Star Brenden Dillon and some board-rattling collisions. Dylan DeMelo shoved Seguin into the boards head-first. Joel Kiviranta was throwing his body.
Dillon flattened John Klingberg in open ice, leading Benn to drop the gloves. It was Benn’s second fight of the season.
“He’s a great leader, he leads by example,” Stars defenseman Ryan Suter said about Benn before the game. “He’s a heart and soul guy. Playing against him, he’s intimidating to play against just the way he plays. He plays hard, he’s big, he’s strong, he’s tough. He’s a good guy to have on your team.”
Dubois’ tip of a Winnipeg point shot gave the Jets a 1-0 lead just 50 seconds into the second period. Peterson tied the game midway through the period by driving the net, as Alexander Radulov banked a pass off his skate past Connor Hellebuyck.
It was Peterson’s ninth goal of the season, and Radulov has primary assists on four of them.
Seguin finished a 3 on 1 rush by hitting the open net after Denis Gurianov slid a cross-slot feed to Seguin. Seguin’s 15th goal continued his recent hot streak, as he now has 11 points in his last 10 games. He started the season with 13 points in 35 games.
Harkins tied the game as the trailer, ripping a shot in the slot past Oettinger after a next sequence of passes by Mark Scheifele and Cole Perfetti.
That set up Benn to nearly play hero on a night when he was a central character.
Benn re-directed a pass from Gurianov at the net-front, and watched as the puck trickled through Hellebuyck. Benn exhaled before he was mobbed by Radulov in celebration.
The goal and fight made up for a shaky start by Benn on Friday night. In the game’s first minute, he mishandled a puck on a breakaway as a Stars chance fizzled. About 5 1/2 minutes into the game, he whiffed on an open net, sending a puck fluttering over the net vacated by Hellebuyck.
Scheifele ruined the storyline. Then Robertson ended the game.
“We control our own destiny,” Suter said. “We play all the teams ahead of us a few times here. If we want it, we have to go and take it.”
