Dallas did not go down without a fight in Game 6, but the fight was not enough. The Stars shut down the Minnesota Wild power play in the second period, converted on one of their own chances and still watched their season end before the third round for the first time in four years.
Mavrik Bourque scored at even strength to give Dallas the lead, and Vladamir Tarasenko answered less than a minute later to tie it back up. Later, Quinn Hughes scored his second goal of the night in the third period by banking the puck in off Ilya Lybushkin’s skate, and Dallas pulled Jake Oettinger for an extra skater with several minutes left in a last push that never found a finish.
The result fit the shape of the series. Dallas had the expected goals edge heading into Game 6, but it could not turn that pressure into goals at 5-on-5. That problem has shadowed the club for the last four playoff runs, and the drought has become hard to ignore: the Stars have had scoring dry up in the playoffs for the last four playoff runs, with a 250 year 5-on-5 scoring drought underscoring just how little offense came at even strength when it mattered most.
That left the power play as Dallas’s only clear edge in the series. The Stars did score with the man advantage in Game 6, but they could not finish enough of their chances at even strength to match the moments that decided the game. Tarasenko’s quick response and Hughes’ second goal of the night made the final stretch feel like a scramble rather than a comeback.
After the final horn, the sense was not that Dallas had been outclassed so much as undone by the same flaw that has followed it through recent springs. The Stars had enough chances to make the series their own. They just never found the finish to do it.