Stars win Game 7, eliminate defending champion Golden Knights

DALLAS -- The Dallas Stars eliminated the defending champion Vegas Golden Knights with a 2-1 win in Game 7 of the Western Conference First Round at American Airlines Center on Sunday.

Dallas, which is the No. 1 seed from the Central Division and Western Conference, won four of the final five games of the series after losing Games 1 and 2 at home.

“Really wanted to win this series. We wanted our turn,” Stars coach Pete DeBoer said. “We felt we did all the right things all year to get the first seed, and then you draw a team like Vegas. I honestly think they’ve got a deeper team than they had last year. To plow through the adversity of being down 2-0, there’s a lot to unpack.”

The Stars will face the Colorado Avalanche, who eliminated the Winnipeg Jets in five games, in the second round.

“There’s probably a lot of doubters out there after Game 2, that probably thought we couldn’t come back. A lot of believers in this room, in this organization,” Dallas captain Jamie Benn said. “We played two pretty good games in the first two and we felt we were the better team. Fortunately, we came out on top.”

Radek Faksa and Wyatt Johnston scored, and Jake Oettinger made 22 saves for the Stars.

“[DeBoer] has a message that’s worked for many different groups of guys. For us, it was we felt like we had been the better team the whole series. If we played our best game, I think we would be happy with the outcome,” Oettinger said. “The focus on the defensive side of the game is what I was really impressed with from the message. If we take care of our own end, those 50-50 plays, if we go to the defensive side like he was talking about, we were going to score. We have a lot of great guys that can put the puck in the net.”

Brett Howden scored, and Adin Hill made 22 saves for the Golden Knights, who were the second wild card from the Western Conference.

“I think going into this series as an eight seed playing the top team in the conference, you expect it to be a long series,” Vegas captain Mark Stone said. “We would have liked to have gotten a game at home there in Games 3 and 4. At the end of the day, we gave ourselves a chance in Game 7 to win the series against a very good hockey team. We didn’t get it done. We felt like we definitely had a team that had a chance to go on a long run.”

Johnston gave Dallas a 1-0 lead at 14:34 of the first period when he intercepted a clearing attempt by Shea Theodore and scored from the high slot. The goal came shortly after Vegas forward Jonathan Marchessault hit the post with a wide-open net.

“[I’m] just trying to do whatever I can to help the team win, whatever that is,” Johnston said. “If that’s a penalty kill, if it’s blocking a shot, if that’s just getting the puck out. Trying to do my part, that’s the focus for me. It takes everyone to win a series.”

Howden tied it 1-1 at 15:25 of the second period, tapping in a backdoor pass from Michael Amadio at the left post on a rush.

“I think we had spurts throughout the series, but I don’t think we ever got to that level that we wanted to,” Golden Knights defenseman Alex Pietrangelo said. “We weren’t giving up much, they weren’t scoring much. They got a few fortunate bounces along the way, they made some good plays. I think both teams played well defensively. Our two goalies (Logan Thompson) and their goalie played well, too. It’s just two real good teams going at it.”  

Faksa scored 44 seconds into the third period to put the Stars back in front 2-1. He kicked a pass from Craig Smith to his stick and scored with a backhand from the right circle that deflected off Alec Martinez.

“Coaches always want to get to another level,” Vegas coach Bruce Cassidy said. “We got to our game at times and so did they. I don’t think either team could sit here and say they were dominating the series or truly at their best the whole time. I thought Game 6 (a 2-0 win) was our best game, and I would hope that would bleed into today, but it didn’t. It wasn’t enough.”