3 Stars: Rantanen to Johnston, an adventurous goalie, & wacky but effective PK tactics in win at Sharks

The Dallas Stars never trailed and found some wacky ways in a 5-3 win against the San Jose Sharks at SAP Center on Thursday.

Rantanen to Johnston is unstoppable

Wyatt Johnston and Mikko Rantanen have found some chemistry on the top line this season. Despite not having a consistent linemate on their left, the duo sits first and third in team scoring. Put them on the power play together, and look out, other 31 teams.

Entering tonight, Johnston led the NHL with 12 power-play goals. Despite not scoring them quite as rapidly as he was early on, he was still three goals ahead of No. 2 on that list, Alex DeBrincat. Rantanen ranked third behind only Connor McDavid and Leon Draisaitl in power-play points.

Well, add another goal for Johnston and another point for Rantanen with the extra man tonight. And was it ever pretty?

The Stars power play remains near or at the top of the league, and they are scoring goals that often look like this. Knowing where each other are on the ice, making clean passes without hesitation or stickhandling, and finishing off their chances. Elite.

Oh, and I almost forgot to mention that Johnston had already scored in the game. And it was a 5-on-5 goal, which he has not done a lot of lately. According to our pal Craig Ludwig, Johnston needs to show he can produce consistently at even strength if he has any shot of making Team Canada at the Olympics.

Does this look like a player who can do that?

The fake hip opener like he is backing down a smaller man in the paint to get the bucket… So nice. He sells former Stars defenseman John Klingberg on the roll move to his backside, quickly pushes off his right skate, and creates just enough space to wire this wrist shot over the glove. Nice.

Rantanen has two assists so far, primary assists, of course, and has jumped Olli Jokinen for the fifth-most points by a Finnish player in NHL history (751).

They say he is adventurous with the puck…

On the DLLS pregame show, we talked about how fun and adventurous Alex Nedeljkovic is with the puck. Sean Shapiro watched him a lot in Detroit and made it clear that he has elite puck skills, but will also make questionable decisions or passes every once in a while.

Through 30 minutes, Nedeljkovic had already diced up the Stars forecheck on multiple occasions, but also turned it over twice in his own end. High-event goaltending, and we are just talking about what he can do with the puck.

San Jose couldn’t create off his passes, and Dallas didn’t make him pay for his mistakes. But that changed in the final minute of the period when Nedeljkovic decided that Justin Hryckowian could really use a goal after not scoring for nearly a month.

While this play was funny and the Stars will happily take the two-goal lead into the third period, I really want to talk more about how much I love Hryckowian’s game.

He is just always going. He’s hard on the forecheck. He battles on the walls and in the corners. He works hard to gain positioning in front on both ends of the ice. He has skill to create when he has the puck and hockey IQ to find open space when he doesn’t. And best of all, he is an absolute pest who often gets under the skin of opponents and finds himself in the majority of post-whistle shenanigans. He makes people mad, and that is a skill in hockey. Trust me, I found a way to do it for years despite being small.

He can also fight, and has joined the ranks along with Jamie Benn, Lian Bichsel, and Mikko Rantanen for Stars skaters who will stand up for their teammates when needed.

Tonight, he showed a lot of that skill and grit, annoying Sharks and tallying his fourth goal of the season to wrap it all up.

Thatta boy.

Stars PK comes up huge AGAIN

The Sharks made this one interesting with Collin Graf’s third goal in two games against Dallas. I heard those ECAC kids are underrated, eh?

But when the Sharks made their third-period push, it was the Dallas penalty kill that had to once again come up big, as it has done since the first month of the season wrapped up. And they did exactly that.

The Stars PK simply does whatever it needs to do to kill a penalty. That means big saves from Jake Oettinger (or Casey DeSmith), which he does often. It means blocked shots. How about Oskar Bäck late in the final San Jose power play… Blocks it, one hand slaps it around the defender and goes off for a change.

And sometimes, it means improvisation to keep the puck out of your net. We’ve seen diving saves, great sticks by Miro Heiskanen or Thomas Harley to keep the puck from crossing the line behind their goalie, and full-on saves from skaters when things get really wacky.

But, wacky times included, I don’t know if we’ve seen what Colin Blackwell did to get out of a tough position and kill a chunk of time late in the power play…

This is incredible. Not only to block the shot and win a race to the puck after your stick goes flying into the neutral zone… But to stay poised enough to bend down and basically dribble the puck with his gloves… Remember, he is a great basketball player, folks.

Blackwell turns his right hand over, pokes the puck to his right, then turns and chases it down before pushing it forward with his right glove again. Then, while fighting off a forechecker, he shields the puck, dives forward, and uses his left glove to slap it down the ice and get off for a change.

Dallas went 3-for-3 on the kill.

Sometimes, you just have to do what it takes. The weird Hryckowian goal, the killed power plays, and this Blackwell… Whatever it was, are good examples of that.

Jamie Benn added the empty-netter to put away another win for Dallas. A win, by the way, for Oettinger on his 27th birthday.

• Ilya Lyubushkin looked very solid defensively tonight.
• Nils Lundkvist made a few key plays, one being the backcheck and analysis of the rush late in the game on a 2-on-1.
• Macklin Celebrini is very good. Sometimes, he seems to be moving too fast either for his own good or for any of his teammates to keep up. He was constantly firing passes that Sharks could not handle or return. But watching him pick up pucks out of his skates and turn and burn with his head WAAAY up is a lot of fun.
• Casey DeSmith is expected to start Friday in Anaheim. DeSmith is riding an 11-game personal point streak (8-0-3).
• Sharks fans doing the shark chomp and the arena playing “Jaws” music before power plays is pretty cool. Not quite as cool as the “fang fingers” in Nashville, though (100 percent sarcasm, that is so dumb.)
• DLLS After Dark brings out the worst (best) in all of us. Don’t forget to join the postgame show.