Ducks once again can’t hold a lead, losing to Stars in overtime
Thomas Harley got the puck and took off skating hard to the other end of the ice, all the way to the middle of the right circle before the young defenseman unleashed his latest game-winning shot.
The 22-year-old Harley scored 38 seconds into overtime to give the Dallas Stars a 4-3 victory over the Ducks on Thursday night. His 10th goal this season was his second OT winner, making him the only NHL defenseman with multiple goals after regulation.
“Just kept skating,” said Harley, who also had the primary assist on fellow defenseman Miro Heiskanen’s tying goal midway through the third period.
Adam Henrique scores twice, but the Ducks can’t stop Artemi Panarin and the New York Rangers from rallying to a 5-2 comeback victory.
“He’s been great all year like that, his ability to skate,” Dallas coach Pete DeBoer said. “I think he blew by everybody on the ice there from goal line to goal line. So, pretty impressive for a young defenseman to skate like that.”
Heiskanen scored after missing the previous 10 games with a lower-body injury.
“A little rusty after three weeks, but I felt all right,” said Heiskanen, who got his fifth goal of the season.
The Stars have won their last 11 home games against Anaheim since October 2015, matching the club’s longest active streak at the American Airlines Center versus any team. They won their 11th in a row there over the Detroit Red Wings two weeks before Christmas.
Ducks goalie John Gibson stopped 40 shots in regulation, but the only Stars shot in overtime was Harley’s wrister.
“I feel like every time we play him, he gives them a chance to win,” DeBoer said of Gibson.
Jake Oettinger made 21 saves in the Dallas net, needing only one in overtime.
Anaheim scored go-ahead goals early in both the second and third periods, though the Stars eventually answered both times.
The Ducks took a 2-1 lead on Troy Terry‘s 12th goal of the season, which came 1:28 into the second period. They scored even quicker in the third, on Jakob Silfverberg‘s shot from just in front of Oettinger only 12 seconds into the period for a 3-2 lead.
In between those, Dallas tied the game at 2-2 on Craig Smith’s goal when he knocked in a loose puck that Gibson gloved while falling with one of his teammates in net. But a replay review determined the glove and puck had fully crossed the line for a good goal.
That ended a wild sequence in which a puck off Gibson was sitting in front of a wide-open net before teammates Jackson LaCombe and Ross Johnston got there to knock it away, but Smith was able to score with a quick wrister.
Matt Duchene’s 16th goal only 2:22 into the game put Dallas up 1-0, with Tyler Seguin getting the secondary assist. That was Seguin’s 652nd career point with the Stars, putting him alone in fifth place on the franchise list by breaking a tie with Dino Ciccarelli.
Urho Vaakanainen tied the game with about five minutes left in the first, about a minute after Dallas thought it had a 2-0 lead. A shot by Jani Hakanpaa appeared to go into and bounce out of the net, though officials immediately signaled no goal and replays showed the puck actually ricocheted off the left post.
“Well, I thought the first period was good for us. I mean, I think they had more chances, but they just took the game over in the second period with possession time,” Ducks coach Greg Cronin said. “We got caught on the ice too long. And when that happens, you get tired legs. And I think they rode momentum all the way through the third period.”
Up next for Ducks: Play on the road for the eighth time in 10 games, at Minnesota on Saturday.
