His road numbers on the season are about as bad as Benn’s - time to show some secondary leadership.Dozens of cars had broken windows by thieves who looked to rummage through their personal belongings. Especially, he needs to drive play through the neutral zone and within the offensive zone. With Heiskanen out, Klingberg needs to return to first pair form. If Dallas can turn the game into a PK/PP battle, they have a chance. Louis’s physicality take them out of just taking care of business. The Stars need to play hockey, and let St. Benn can set the tone for the Stars, but Dallas can try to outphysical the Blues. Marco Scandella (6) - Robert Bortuzzo (41) Nathan Walker (26) - Tyler Bozak (21) - Oskar Sundqvist (70)Īlexei Toropchenko (65) - Dakota Joshua (54) - Matthew Peca (53) Pavel Buchnevich (89) - Ivan Barbashev (49) - Vladimir Tarasenko (91) Louis Blues Lineupīrandon Saad (20) - Ryan O’Reilly (90) - Logan Brown (22) Riley Tufte (27) - Luke Glendening (11) - Denis Gurianov (34)īraden Holtby (70) St. Michael Raffl (18) - Radek Faksa (12) - Alexander Radulov (47) Jacob Peterson (40) - Jamie Benn (14) - Tyler Seguin (91) Jason Robertson (21) - Roope Hintz (24) - Joe Pavelski (16) Maybe the Captain can shake off his road blues and find a way to lead this team back into the win column. But this is a manic depressive Dallas Stars team, and the last thing the group needs is to be missing its actual best player. Given the number of contributors out of the Blues lineup, that really isn’t much of an excuse. Joel Kiviranta is also still out with an upper body injury - neither player made the trip to Missouri. The more pressing downside is that Miro Heiskanen appears to have succumbed to the non-Covid illness still decimating the room. On the positive side, Roope Hintz and Alexander Radulov look to be drawing back in (I suppose leading to a downside of Riley Damiani and Ty Dellandrea being sent back to Cedar Park).
There is good news and bad news going into the matchup.
The Captain needs to find a way to beat the Blues without playing the Blues heavy game. Louis still brings that game, but there aren’t many holdovers from that era still playing with Dallas. A few years ago, Dallas decided to supersize the lineup so that they could match the physical intensity of the Blues. Riding that line as hard and for as long as Rick Bowness did to start the season will skew those numbers for the rest of the season.īut the point is - if your Captain, the guy who isn’t all that vocal but leads by example - is coughing up a hairball outside the state of Texas, who does this team turn to when faced with a hostile environment. Benn, Tyler Seguin and Alexander Radulov have been about as good together as Grumpier Old Men. Now, splits are interesting things, and Benn’s road numbers include a significant dose of the now imploded Supernova line. Yes - that includes Radek Faksa, Tanner Kero and anyone else on the roster who you may want to kick while their down. On the road, that number is under 40%, last on the team. At home, the Captain sports a spiffy 59% xGF%, coming in just ahead of Roope Hintz among Stars regulars. Look no further than Jamie Benn to see the problem. The teams best (read - highest paid) players haven’t delivered away from the sweet confines of the American Airlines Center. Road splits haven’t been kind to the Dallas Stars.