The Dallas Stars made their evening harder before they made it comfortable. Justin Hryckowian was called for holding at 13:41 of the first period, and Nils Lundkvist followed with another Dallas penalty at 15:15. Chicago had power-play opportunities in a scoreless opening period, putting Dallas’s penalty kill to work before either club had scored.
Dallas killed every Chicago power play, scored once on its own advantage and beat the Blackhawks 4-0 Saturday at United Center. The special-teams difference was small but useful: Dallas won the special-teams exchange 1-0, and that margin helped turn a potentially awkward game into a clean road win.
Chicago’s Roman Kantserov was penalized at 14:22, between Dallas’ two minors, and the overlapping penalties changed the manpower situation. Dallas’s minors therefore did not produce four uninterrupted minutes of a Chicago advantage. The overlapping calls altered the numbers of skaters, but the Blackhawks still had extra-man opportunities and did not score.
Chicago received two more power-play opportunities after the first period. Roope Hintz was penalized for cross-checking at 18:06 of the second, and Tyler Myers took a tripping minor at 2:49 of the third. Dallas killed both. Oettinger stopped four shots during Chicago’s power plays as part of his 19-save shutout, and Chicago never found a goal to make the final half of the game uncomfortable.
Jake Oettinger stopped all five Chicago shots in the first period. Dallas had 12 shots of its own, so the opening frame was not a defensive siege, but the Stars had already introduced unnecessary risk. A penalty kill does not have to dominate to matter. It has to prevent the opponent from turning opportunity into a lead.
Dallas’s only successful power play supplied a different part of the advantage.
Robertson provided the lone power-play goal of the evening at 4:58 in the second. Rantanen and Harley received assists on the Dallas breakthrough. It was Dallas’ first goal and its only power-play goal on four opportunities. Chicago finished 0-for-4. One Dallas conversion was enough to win that exchange.
Robertson also finished with seven shots and an assist, making his goal part of a broader attacking night rather than an isolated fortunate bounce. Still, the important distinction here is situational. Dallas had not needed to score during its early penalty trouble; it eventually capitalized when the advantage belonged to the Stars.
The penalty kill mattered most because Dallas kept adding at even strength. Arttu Hyry scored at 14:10 of the second period, with Sam Steel assisting, then scored again 1:27 into the third with Nils Lundkvist credited with the assist. Those goals stretched Robertson’s one-goal advantage into a three-goal cushion before Chicago could make its power-play chances count.
