Without half of their elder statesmen line, the Dallas Stars struggled to score in the first game of their two-game series against the Chicago Blackhawks. Joe Pavelski started the game with Jamie Benn and Ty Dellandrea on the wings, and to put things mildly, it didn’t work. The line generated no scoring chances, no expected goals; literally no shots on net.
It pushed head coach Rick Bowness into activating the line mixer, which at least led to Jason Robertson joining Roope Hintz and Denis Gurianov in, by far, his best NHL game to date.