Stars bury Ducks behind Jason Robertson’s hat trick – San Bernardino Sun

by Arthur · December 2, 2022

DALLAS – It was Jason Robertson Night for the Dallas Stars and the Ducks were reduced to spectators at the American Airlines Center.

The Arcadia native recorded his third career hat trick — scoring once in each period — to lead the Stars to a 5-0 victory over the Ducks on Thursday night. Robertson extended his point streak to 17 games. Defender Miro Heiskanen added three assists.

“To a man, we should all be embarrassed by the effort,” Ducks forward Derek Grant said. “We left (goalie) Stolie (Anthony Stolarz) out to dry after he did a lot of good things for us.”

Strong but accurate words.

The Ducks trailed by a goal after the first period. Robertson had won a puck battle with Isac Lundestrom and tapped it in off Duck defenseman Urho Vaakanainen’s foot past Stolarz at 4:13. But the nature of the game turned dramatically in the second.

“We played well in the first, but once they got second and third, it’s like we all just sat back and didn’t want to let another one in,” Grant said. “You can’t play like that in this league, you’re going to get burned.

“The guys have to be (hacked) off. They need to be embarrassed. It’s not fun for anybody, but you have to find a way to take it and use it as fuel.”

Said Ducks coach Dallas Eakins: “As soon as it went 2-0, for some reason we wanted to change our game plan instead of settling down. We just need to play the same way all night, 60 minutes .”

Stars goaltender Jake Oettinger made 31 saves to record his second shutout of the season and fourth of his career. He is 4-0-0 in his career against the Ducks. The Ducks have lost 10 of their last 12 games overall and are 2-10-2 on the road this season.

Another point of comparison: After 24 games, the Ducks (6-16-2) are behind the pace in the NHL expansion season. In 1993-94, they were 8-14-2 after 24 games. They lost their 24th game that season – to the Sharks – which ended a four-game winning streak.

Back to the present…

The Stars, who have the league’s third-best power play, went 2-for-4 with the man advantage. Dallas scored once in the first period, added two in the second, and two more in the third.

“A lot of the stuff they get is us playing slow,” Grant said. “Or making bad reads and giving them opportunities and that’s where we get in trouble and that’s where we start receiving the game.

“We have talked about it. To a man, we all have to step up and commit to the way we want to play. And that is when we will be successful.”

Robertson completed the hat trick, on the power play, at 1:23 of the third period, beating Stolarz low to his blocker side with a wrist shot from the top of the right circle. It was his 22nd goal of the season, which leads the NHL.

“It looks like everything right now that he puts on the net is going in,” Grant said. “Obviously we knew who he was coming into this game and we didn’t do a good enough job of stopping him.”

Ducks defenseman Simon Benoit said: “You have to learn from it and you have to put it behind you. We have two other games on the road right now and we just have to focus on them. That’s it. There’s no point just dwelling on it.”

The Ducks played the third period one forward short when Lundestrom suffered an upper body injury in the second period and did not return. He played 6:32 and only three shifts in the second period. And the concern is that he could be out for a while.