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A scintillating first period from the Anaheim Ducks saw them open their Stanley Cup playoff series against the Dallas Stars with a 4-3 victory, but it was rookie goalie Frederik Andersen who stole the majority of the headlines after his 32 saves. After a sensational regular season, the Ducks rightly begun their playoff campaign full of confidence, and wasted little time in taking the game to Dallas in the opening game of the series.
The damage for the Texans was done in an explosive first period in which Anaheim scored three quick goals courtesy of Ryan Getzlaf, Kyle Palmieri and Mathieu Perreault, and by the time Mat Beleskey scored the Ducks fourth in the second period the game was all but beyond Dallas.
Anaheim booked their place in the playoffs as the Western Conference’s No.1 seed following their best ever regular season, winning a record 54 games and scoring a record number of points (116) and goals (263) on their way to a second straight Pacific Division title.
In their first appearance in the playoffs since 2008, Dallas only really seemed to wake up at 4-0 down. Jamie Benn and Colton Sceviour grabbed power-play goals to cut the deficit to two goals, and by the time Tyler Seguin popped up to score a goal in the final period the Ducks looked in real danger of throwing the game away. But rookie goalie Andersen proved just why he had been selected ahead of Jonas Hiller and John Gibson for the most important game of Anaheim’s season.
Andersen, who went 20-5 in his debut NHL season, was handed the start by Boudreau after a string of poor performances of Hiller in recent weeks, and the Danish stopped repaid his coach’s faith by producing 32 saves in the game, including a number of incredible stops late in the game to stop Dallas from completing an epic comeback.
Speaking before the victory over Dallas, Anaheim defenseman Francois Beauchemin poured praise on Andersen for how he had performed in his first season in the big leagues and the stability he brought to the Ducks defence.
“Just his presence in the net; being so big and athletic. He makes the big saves with control, not being [out of position]. He plays the puck really well. For a defenseman, when we go back to get the puck, he’ll make you a pass or clear the zone. Communication will be huge with him to make sure we let him know what we want to do with the puck.”
While admitting his side had plenty to work on ahead of Game 2 of the series, Anaheim coach Bruce Boudreau was happy to see the Ducks open up the series with an important victory that sees them as favourites with bet365 to now go on and reach the next round of the playoffs.
“I’m sure we didn’t put the fear of God in them tonight, and they probably gained some confidence,” coach Bruce Boudreau said. “We didn’t play that good. We gave the puck away too many times tonight, but we’ll go back to the drawing board.”
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