The Dallas Stars four-day, three-loss west coast road trip concluded Saturday night with a 2-1 loss to the Sharks at San Jose’s SAP Center.
Michael Raffl‘s notched his fourth goal of the season in the middle of the third period. He got a small piece of Jani Hakanpaa’s shot to tip the puck in and cut the score in half. The Stars were unable to keep the momentum going and suffered the loss. The team’s record falls to 13-10-2.
“That’s probably the best road game we have played all year,” Stars coach Rick Bowness said after the loss. “We just didn’t score, but we did a lot of good things tonight.”
Stars goalie Braden Holtby saved 23-of-25 shots in the loss. Goals came from Sharks Tomas Hertl in the first period and Erik Karlsson in the second. Dallas challenged the latter goal for potential goalie interference, but the ruling went against the Stars.
Dallas was without Roope Hintz for the contest. The 33-year-old left-winger sat out with a non-COVID related illness.
The Hintz illness added to a list of things that went wrong for the Stars on the west-coast road trip. Other highlights from the road trip are listed below:
- Coach Bowness had an errant puck land on his head after his team yielded a goal in Las Vegas.
- The Stars missed their flight to Los Angeles because of a bomb hoax in Las Vegas.
- A seven-game win streak snapped against the Golden Knights.
- ESPN reported that Stars goaltender Ben Bishop — degenerative knee ailment — would be placed on long-term injured reserve. Stars general manager Jim Nill says that Bishop’s injury “marks the end of his career.”
- First three-game slide of the season for the Stars.
The Stars return to home ice when they host the St. Louis Blues (15-8-4) at the American Airlines Center this Wednesday, December 14. The first puck is due to drop at 7:30 p.m.
