Jason Robertson scored in all three periods of the Stars’ 5-0 win over the Ducks in Anaheim on Thursday night, giving him his third career hat trick and pushing his point streak to 17 games long.
Dallas defender Miro Heiskanen added three assists in the game (matching a career-high), Roope Hintz, fresh off his new contract, had two more, and Jake Oettinger (14-6-4) stopped all 31 shots he faced in his fourth NHL shutout for the Stars. Joel Kiviranta and Wyatt Johnston also netted goals for the Stars.
The win pushes the first-place Stars to 14-6-4 on the season for 32 points in the Western Central, three points ahead of the second-place Jets (14-6-1, 29 points).
WHAT TO KNOW
The Stars, who have the third-best powerplay in the league, scored twice out of four opportunities with the man advantage. In addition to their first-period goal, Dallas scored twice in the second and twice more in the third.
To finish off his hat trick, Robertson, the 23-year-old center, scored at 1:23 of the third period while on the powerplay by firing a wrist shot from the top of the right circle that beat Stolarz low to his blocker side. His season total of 22 goals now ranks first in the NHL.
BY THE NUMBERS
It was the fourth time in Robertson’s last six games that he had scored multiple times. His point streak began on October 27 when the Stars dumped the Capitols 2-0 (also an Oettinger shutout). As Robertson creeps up on the franchise record of 20 set by Brian Bellows in 1986, his scoring streak is already the longest for the team since they relocated from Minnesota to Dallas in 1993.
Since the 2015–16 season, Dallas has defeated Anaheim nine times in a row at home, winning all of those contests.
Duck’s defender John Klingberg sat out for the fourth game in a row due to injury. The Stars selected Klingberg in the fifth round of the 2010 NHL Draft, and the Swede played with the team from 2014-15 through last season before heading west to Southern California this past offseason.
WHAT THEY SAID
“You kind of get used to it, and you almost have to sit and think about it after, about how special it is what you are witnessing,” Dallas coach Pete DeBoer told NHL.com of Robertson. “It’s unbelievable.”
“It looks like everything right now he’s putting at the net is going in,” Grant said of Robertson, Los Angeles Daily News reported. “Obviously we knew who he was coming into this game and we didn’t do a good enough job stopping him.”
“I’m just getting in position to shoot the puck,” Robertson told NHL.com. “I just got to get past that first guy and get it on net.”
NEXT UP
Dallas will host the Wild of Minnesota on Sunday, December 4, at the American Airlines Center starting at 2 p.m.
