Special Teams Struggles Continue in Stars' Loss to Avalanche

The Stars surrendered two shorthanded goals in Saturday's loss to Colorado

The Dallas Stars have struggled on special teams throughout this recent slump, which dates back before the beginning of the new year, and those problems came front and center in Saturday night’s 3-1 loss to the Avalanche at American Airlines Center.

Defenseman Jason Demers scored a goal on a power play, but the Stars were otherwise bad with the advantage on Saturday. They surrendered two shorthand goals to the Avs, one to Carl Soderberg in the first and one to Gabriel Landeskog in the second, which were provided the difference and sent the Stars to their fifth loss in six games.

"We made too many big mistakes that cost us," Demers said, per Mike Heika of the Dallas Morning News. "Our power play has been struggling for a while, and we all need to pick it up. It's a privilege to play on the power play and penalty kill, and those are two areas we haven't been good. We all have to pick it up and clean that aspect up, because it's costing us games."

The Stars are still fourth in the league on the power play, but it wasn’t their friend on Saturday.

"The whole point of the power play is to swing momentum in our favor," said left winger Patrick Sharp. “You don't have to score every opportunity, but it's an opportunity to generate some momentum and get some shots on net, some puck possession and tire out their guys. We weren't able to do that tonight.”

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