Dallas Stars can no longer hide from their goaltender’s performance
The last time a Dallas Stars coach pointed out that his starting goalie wasn’t very good, it got Pete DeBoer fired.
Glen Gulutzan should give it another game before he points out that he needs more from Jake Oettinger, but he does. Especially if the players in front of Oettinger insist on having the game shoved down every orifice of their body.
The Minnesota Wild defeated the Stars 6-1 on Saturday afternoon in Game 1 of their first-round Stanley Cup playoff series. Game 2 is Monday night at the American Airlines Center.
When you fall behind 4-0 early in the second period, like the Stars did, it’s not all on the goalie. They were all bad, but when your goalie is terrible, he always stands above the rest.
“The last goal was bad, but I think I did good things,” Oettinger said in the locker room to the media throng after the game. “A lot that I need to be better at. Just make more saves, that’s the only thing I can focus on. I can’t control what’s going on in front of me.”
He allowed five goals on 28 shots, and was outplayed by a rookie goalie making his first career playoff start.
The trouble for Gulutzan is this Game 1 now expands the “body of work” that DeBoer famously pointed out about his goalie after the team was eliminated from the Western Conference finals by Edmonton last season. A few days after DeBoer made those comments, he was effectively fired by the players, even if the message was delivered by GM Jim Nill.
Dating back to that Western Conference finals series last year against the Oilers, the Stars have dropped five straight playoff games by embarrassing margins. Oettinger has been the starter in net for all them, and the Oilers and Wild scored at least three times every game.
In their past six playoff games, the Stars have been outscored 28-12. Otter allowed all but three of those goals. In the decisive Game 5 against Edmonton at home, Oettinger allowed two goals on the first two shots, and DeBoer pulled him early in the first period for Casey DeSmith.
In Game 1 on Saturday against Minnesota, Oettinger allowed a power-play goal less than six minutes in. To start the second period, the Wild blitzed Oettinger with three even-strength goals in the first seven minutes.
Gulutzan said he did not consider pulling Oettinger, and he put most of it on the players in front of his goalie.
“To a man they were better than us,” Gulutzan said. “We didn’t win anything. You put yourself as risk for what happened.”
On a good day, Oettinger stops two of the three he saw in the second period. The Wild added another power-play goal in the middle of the third period, which by that time, the game was over. Just for fun, they added an empty-netter late in the game.
Gulutzan’s leash on his goalie should now be nice and tight. Oettinger gets the first period in Game 2, and that’s it. If Oettinger is again “generous,” the coach will have no choice but to pull the No. 1 again at home of a playoff game.
The odds of the Stars continuing to win these playoff series where they trail 1-0 is eventually going to bite this organization. The last time the Stars won a Game 1 of Round 1 is 2019.
Between 2022 and 2025, they dropped eight consecutive Game 1s, a streak they ended in the second round last year. They reached the Western Conference finals every season for the last three years, but to ask a team to routinely come back down 1-0 will not turn out well.
“We’re not doing it on purpose,” Stars forward Mikko Rantanen said after the game. “It’s not ideal.”
Even if Oettinger plays well, the Stars are vulnerable to losing this series; Minnesota is good, and more than capable of a deep playoff run. The Stars have no room for their starting goalie to be anything other than good.
And Jake Oettinger was not good.
This story was originally published April 18, 2026 at 7:40 PM.
