– by Adesina O. Koiki
A Lot of Sports Talk editor-in-chief
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DALLAS — Depending on how you look at it, either the Dallas Stars’ defense put in a serious shift or barely broke a sweat as it barely faced an offensive threat the entire game. At least on the other end, the Stars were a menace and did more than enough to continue their winning ways to begin the new year.
Roope Hiintz scored twice for the Stars, including one on the power play, as Dallas defeated the Owwata Senators 4-2 inside American Airlines Center. Jamie Benn and Matt Duchene also scored for the Stars, who allowed just 13 shots on goal as Jake Oettinger had to make just 11 saves to earn the win.
The Stars have struggled mightily on the power play at home, but were able to open the scoring with the man advantage, when Hintz deflected a shot from the top of the left face-off circle by Robertson at the 4:39 mark of the first period.
“We have had a lot of good looks before, but just haven’t scored. I think it’s good that now we have some go in,” Hintz said. “Just try to build on that and keep going. Try to create something every game, and sometimes it doesn’t go in. If you get chances, it’s always good. Can’t get frustrated, just keep trying and putting it to the net.”
Brady Tkachuk had a goal and an assist for the Senators while Leevi Merilainen made 21 saves. The Senators are 7-3-0 in its past 10 games, and tonight’s game was the seventh of a franchise-long nine-game road trip.
“We got what we deserved. We weren’t good enough tonight,” Ottawa coach Travis Green said. “We didn’t play 60 minutes. Our power play wasn’t very good. We didn’t make enough plays with the puck. We weren’t sharp with the puck when we needed to be. We took a lot of penalties as well that we can’t take against a good team. I just didn’t think we looked sharp tonight.”
*Editor’s note: Above the byline is the photo gallery from Thursday evening’s game, with photos taken by ALOST staff photographer Ross James. After clicking on a photo to enlarge the picture, press the left and right arrow buttons on either side of the caption to scroll through the rest of the pictures that appear on the first page. Also, click on the numbers and/or arrow appearing immediately below the picture grid to load the next set of photos. There are 25 pictures in total.
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