Ryan Leonard sent the puck in from the left circle with Washington’s extra skater out and 1:02 on the clock. The goal made it 6-5. Suddenly Dallas was one shot from overtime in a game it had led by three early in the third period.
The Stars won Tuesday in Washington, but the two goals that put it at risk asked very different things of their defense.
Justin Sourdif’s goal at 12:55 was an even-strength sequence. Anthony Beauvillier’s shot came off Sourdif, then Jake Oettinger, before the puck rolled in. Leonard’s goal at 18:58 was a manpower problem: Washington had removed its goaltender, created a 6-on-5, and finished through the extra attacker. Treating those goals as one general defensive collapse would miss the more useful distinction.
Dallas had to handle both kinds of trouble in the same period. Sourdif’s goal made it 6-4 during ordinary play, with no penalty creating the opening. Leonard’s cut the margin to one during the late push.
There were no third-period penalties, so the Capitals’ pressure was not interrupted by a fresh power play or a Dallas penalty kill. The Stars had to defend the score as it stood, then defend the extra skater when Washington chose its final gamble.
Roope Hintz had given Dallas room early in the period. At 1:23, his intended pass deflected off Martin Fehervary and went past Charlie Lindgren, making the score 6-3. Esa Lindell and Jason Robertson were credited with the assists. It was Dallas’s only third-period goal, and its value was obvious: it let Dallas give up two goals and still leave with the win.
But Hintz’s goal did not settle anything. Washington still had almost the entire period to work back into the contest, and its two later goals required different readings. Sourdif’s goal began with a shot and took two changes of direction to get in.
Leonard’s finish required Washington to create a sixth-skater advantage and execute before time ran out. One was an unpredictable event in normal play; the other was a direct late-game pressure situation.
The Capitals had already demonstrated how quickly the scoreboard could change in the second period. Jordan Kyrou scored on a power play at 11:00, turning Cole Hutson’s shot and rebound sequence into Washington’s first goal. Jakob Chychrun added another with the man advantage with thirty seconds left, converting a one-timer from Dylan Strome’s pass.
Those two plays helped Washington move from a 4-0 deficit to a 5-3 intermission score. Washington finished 2-for-3 with the man advantage, while Dallas went 1-for-2.
That special-teams exchange explains part of the danger without explaining everything. Dallas led 5-3 after a second period that contained seven goals, then restored a three-goal margin through Hintz. Washington’s late response came at even strength and 6-on-5 rather than on a third-period power play.
Dallas therefore had to solve two separate defensive tasks: keep an altered puck from becoming a goal during normal play and withstand a deliberate numerical disadvantage at the finish.