By STEPHEN HAWKINS (AP Sports Writer)
DALLAS (AP) — Radek Faksa made a promise to his 2 1/2-year-old son when they were playing together before the Dallas Stars took the ice for Game 7.
Faksa did indeed score in his return to the lineup after missing four games because of an undisclosed injury. His go-ahead goal came on a backhander 44 seconds into the third period, after his son had been taken home, and Dallas beat the defending Stanley Cup champion Vegas Golden Knights 2-1 on Sunday night to wrap up the first-round series.
“I’m happy I did,” Faksa said. “And so I can show him the video in the morning, and we can watch it together.”
Only captain Jamie Benn and Tyler Seguin have played longer for the Stars than Faksa, a fourth-liner in his ninth season who got his goal from the circle to the left of goalie Adin Hill. Dallas also got another Game 7 goal from 20-year-old Wyatt Johnston.
Jake Oettinger had 21 saves in his second Game 7 victory. He also had the Stars’ only penalty, though they killed that off after he was called for tripping Ivan Barbashev in front of the net midway through the third.
“The last period was a clinic. Just so proud of the guys of how we responded,” Oettinger said. “It’s a long playoffs and you’re going to need different guys to step up at different times. A lot of hockey left so hopefully a lot more heroes. It’s going to be a run ride.”
The Stars, the No. 1 seed in the West, move on to play well-rested Colorado in the second round. Game 1 is in Dallas on Tuesday night, a week after the Avalanche wrapped up their series against Winnipeg with a Game 5 victory.
Brett Howden scored for Vegas, which couldn’t pull off another series winner in Dallas, where last year the Knights wrapped up the Western Conference Final with a win in Game 6. Hill had 22 saves in his third game of this series after Logan Thompson started the first four.
The visitor won the first four games in this series until the home teams held serve the last three games.
“There’s probably a lot of doubters out there. After Game 2, they probably thought we couldn’t come back,” Benn said. “A lot of believers in this room, in this organization. And we showed ’em.”
Dallas has won Game 7s in each of its first two postseasons for coach Pete DeBoer, who is now 8-0 in his career in such games with four different teams. That includes the Knights’ only Game 7 wins in 2020 and 2021 when he was their coach.
Johnston scored his series-high fourth goal on a wrister from the top of the slot with 5:26 left in the first period after picking off a clearing pass by Shea Theodore that his teammate, Tomas Hertl, missed when taking a twisting swipe at it.
A day after his 20th birthday last May, Johnston became the youngest player in NHL history with a game-clinching goal in a Game 7. He gathered a puck that ricocheted off the back boards in the third period of the Stars’ 2-1 win over Seattle in that second-round series.
The goal Sunday against came in quick succession after Vegas had two scoring chances. Oettinger made a tough save to deny Jack Eichel and Jonathan Marchessault then shot the rebound off the left post, and got a hit on Johnston before the Dallas youngster skated to the other end and scored about 10 seconds later.
Coach Bruce Cassidy of Vegas said that some of his players may have trouble sleeping tonight because of what happened in the game. He mentioned that they hit a post, missed an open net, and then the other team scored right after those plays. He also mentioned that these things happen in hockey when two closely matched teams play.
Both teams scored 16 goals in the series.
Vegas, which had 22 of its 27 players from the Stanley Cup-winning team, tied the game in the second period when Michael Amadio made a pass to Howden, who scored by poking the puck into the open left side of the net behind Oettinger.
The only coach other than DeBoer to win eight Game 7s is Darryl Sutter, who had a record of 8-3 in such games over 182 playoff games in 15 postseasons with four teams.
The Knights have a 2-2 record in Game 7s. DeBoer was also the opposing coach in their other loss, to San Jose in 2019.
It was only the second time out of 16 that the Stars won a best-of-seven series after losing the first two games. The only other time was in the very first playoff series in franchise history, when the Minnesota North Stars were down 0-2 before beating the Los Angeles Kings in seven games to open the 1968 playoffs.
___
AP NHL playoffs: https://apnews.com/hub/stanley-cup and https://www.apnews.com/hub/NHL
