The Dallas Stars have the top power play in the NHL this season but Saturday night against the Florida Panthers, it did nothing.
Dallas had three power play chances — and the Panthers actually outshot the Stars despite the disadvantage.
The Panthers played perhaps their best defensive game of the season Saturday, especially considering the team they were playing.
Florida shut out the Stars 4-0, holding the high-octane Stars to a season-low 15 shots on goal.
Dallas and Florida both had two shots on goal in the opening period, but the Panthers held the Stars to just seven shots in a second period they scored three goals in.
It was the kind of game Paul Maurice hoped to see.
“I loved our game, because we all understood what was going on, on the ice,’’ Maurice said. “There wasn’t anybody on a different program and we played real fast and real tight. It felt like that we had been playing better lately and we played our game in Utah, but that’s a tough back-to-back.
“We deserved the loss, but you have to get off the mat here in this league because you are going to get beat. You are going to have five or six of those a year where you just get beat bad, and you need to be able to rebound.”
Florida, which has won four of its past five, were slow and a certainly a step off in Thursday’s 6-2 loss to the Avalanche.
Blame it on the altitude, the second of a back-to-back — or both — but it was obvious the Panthers were not happy with the performance.
It showed on Saturday.
“They’re coming off a loss that wouldn’t sit well with probably a two-time Stanley Cup champion,’’ Dallas coach Glen Gulutzan said. “They brought their A-game tonight, and you guys got to see it tonight. I just thought that they stayed with it. They capitalized quicker than we did … but they’re never going to change a thing.”
Florida was extremely strong on the defensive side of the ice, giving the Stars room to move the puck up and into the zone, but allowed little space once the Stars got there.
Dallas did a lot of passing, but there was very little room to work.
“I really liked the way that we played through the neutral zone,’’ said Brad Marchand, who scored twice. “That’s usually where we will have really good or really bad games and it’s kind of how we play through the neutral zone. We did a really good job there tonight.
“Sometimes you get bounces, but I think after we had a day off we all felt a lot better. Coming back, the elevation can be tough in Colorado and with the travel, but we had a really good day off and I think we all felt better today.”
Dallas not only has the NHL’s top power play, but one of the top penalty kills as well.
When Marchand scored to make it 3-0 with 15 seconds left in the second period, it snapped Dallas’ streak at 33 straight kills.
The Stars had not allowed a power play goal in its previous 10 games, a run that dated to Nov. 25.
Sergei Bobrovsky was only forced to make 15 saves, but he made some big ones throughout the night and got his 52nd career shutout to pass Tomas Vokoun (51) and tie Tuukka Rask (52) for the sixth-most in NHL history by a goaltender born outside of North America.
The only others with more are Dominik Hasek (81), Henrik Lundqvist (64), Pekka Rinne (60), Evgeni Nabokov (59) and Jaroslav Halak (53).
“That was a good performance by our group, it was defensively great and offensively great. We did a great job to slow them down,’’ Bobrovsky said.
“It’s a fast team. It’s a good team, but we didn’t give them anything. It was good play by our group.”
ON DECK: GAME No. 32
FLORIDA PANTHERS at TAMPA BAY LIGHTNING
