Razor: No one that was on that 99 team was on the ice or bench, but Stu Barnes was on the Sabres in the Finals against that 99 team. Close enough?
When the Stars begin playing 60 minutes they'll be alright.
Once again the Stars came out a little flat. I'm not sure flat is even the right word to describe it, tepid maybe? The Oil brought the physical game to the Stars from the outset, and for a while it didn't look like the Stars wanted any part of it. Early in the second the hits were 10-0 in favor of Edmonton.
James Neal made sure that changed. He was laying some thunderous hits early in the 2nd. People might fight me on this, and I welcome it, but James Neal is the best player on the Stars. Morrow is definitely the soul of the team, but he isn't as talented. Neal can literally do everything on the ice. If he wants the puck he will take it, period. The bull move he made to the front of the net early in the 1st was classic. Every time he was near a puck possessing defender their life was hell. The Neal/Richards/Eriksson line might not be there yet, but by seasons end it will be the top line in the Pacific.
A few things stood out negatively. The most glaring one early was the passing. The first point of Jamie Benn's career was because of a bad cross-point pass that he shouldn't have made (Benn was impressive otherwise). There were several other less than crisp passing plays out there tonight. I imagine that will be addressed soon.
The defense and goaltending were pretty clearly not on the same page. The Woywitka/Niskanen pairing just doesn't do it for me. They both look like they deserve ice time, but not together. The Dustin Penner goal early made Woywitka and Turco look pretty foolish. Speaking of Turco, he wasn't terrible. He was screened a little bit by Daley on Gagner's goal (though Daley was 20 feet away from him), and Grossman deflected the Grebeshkov goal in. He just looked like he was fighting himself a lot (and his defenders) and having trouble seeing the puck. It was ugly at times.
The face off situation was bad. After the first Razor had Ott at 4/5 and the rest of the team at 1/10. The special teams however were better. 2 PPG and a shorty on the night for the Stars. Baby steps I suppose.
Tom Wandell can take a beating and still perform. He and Ott made an excellent penalty killing duo. He, Brunnstrom, and Ott were a pretty effective line. Ott did his thing while Brunnstrom and Wandell looked to have a little chemistry. It was nice to see. I think Wandell has a pretty solid future as a 3rd line center in this league.
Ultimately they got points. Morrow netted 2 goals, but he wasn't himself. He'll get there. Ribeiro wasn't particularly great for all 60 minutes. He'll get there too. If you told me the Stars would take a point out of Edmonton without Morrow and Ribeiro playing at their top level I would've taken it. So, I'll take this. It was very encouraging.
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