Casey DeSmith turned aside all 33 shots he faced to help the Dallas Stars earn a 2-0 road victory over the St. Louis Blues on Saturday.
Evgenii Dadonov and Esa Lindell both scored for the Stars, while Jordan Binnington made 17 saves in the losing effort.
The Stars got the scoring started early as 7:07 into the contest, Dadonov broke the deadlock.
Dadonov found himself alone with Binnington and awkwardly slid the puck under the Blues goaltenders’ pads after Binnington failed to poke check the puck away.
Blues coach Jim Montgomery was visibly upset after the goal and decided to call a timeout in an attempt to re-energize his group.
The Blues got a quick boost after the timeout as Brandon Saad narrowly missed on a rebound opportunity.
Then, with 10:24 left in the opening frame and while on the power play, the Stars struck for a second time.
This time Lindell found the back of the net on a one-timed shot off a slick pass from Roope Hintz.
Dadonov picked up his second point of the period with an assist on Lindell’s marker.
The Blues looked poised to find their first goal within the opening minute of the second period, but DeSmith turned aside Jordan Kyrou’s shot from in tight.
After a seemingly easy first period, DeSmith was challenged more in the middle frame, but got in front of all 14 Blues shots.
One of his best saves of the period came at 8:17 when he reached his glove out and snatched Jake Neighbours’ shot.
The Stars headed back to the power play less than a minute into the third period, but the best scoring opportunity belonged to the Blues as Colton Parayko found himself with the puck on a three-on-two. Unfortunately for St. Louis, the big defenseman couldn’t fire his shot past DeSmith.
Mathieu Joseph took a perfect pass from Robert Thomas with 8:12 remaining in the contest, but despite having a wide-open cage in front of him, he found iron.
Philip Broberg followed suit just mere minutes later as his wrist shot bounced off the post.
–Field Level Media
