Dallas won 6-5 in Washington on Tuesday, but the Capitals received the better exchange of manpower. Two second-period penalties gave Washington more than extra time with five skaters against four; they gave the game a pair of carefully timed chances to become competitive again. The Stars escaped because their offense had built enough distance before the penalties arrived, not because those mistakes were harmless.
Begin with the later infraction, since it produced the sharper immediate cost. Lian Bichsel was called for holding at 18:20 of the second period, with Dallas leading 5-2. Jakob Chychrun scored at 19:30, one-timing a pass from Dylan Strome to make it 5-3.
Washington had 30 seconds left in the period after the goal, and the Capitals had transformed the final stretch from a Dallas advantage into a setup for a much more uncomfortable third.
The scoreline still favored the Stars, but timing gave that goal extra weight. A power-play conversion with the period nearly gone leaves little room for the other team to answer before intermission. Dallas had established a three-goal lead; Washington ended the frame with a two-goal deficit and the knowledge that its best route back had already worked once.
The earlier penalty carried a different kind of warning. At 9:30, Dallas was assessed a too-many-men bench minor. There was no dramatic board battle to analyze and no single defensive play to praise or condemn. The infraction simply handed Washington a two-minute advantage while the Capitals were trying to recover from a 4-0 hole.
Jordan Kyrou converted that opportunity at 11:00. His goal came from a rebound of Cole Hutson’s shot, with Dylan Strome and Hutson assisting, and it cut Dallas’ lead to 4-1. Washington had not needed to manufacture a long stretch of pressure to receive the opening; Dallas had supplied the manpower imbalance from the bench.
The goal also arrived before Bichsel’s later holding call, making the two penalties separate contributions to the same narrowing margin.
Dallas knew what a power play could buy because the Stars had already used one to create their opening cushion. Tom Wilson’s roughing penalty at 18:54 of the first period carried into the second, and Jason Robertson scored 23 seconds into the new frame. Wyatt Johnston and Roope Hintz assisted on that goal, which moved Dallas ahead 2-0.
The Stars’ first advantage became a goal. Washington’s two second-period chances created by Dallas penalties both became goals.
That imbalance did not decide the night because Robertson supplied an extraordinary counterweight. He scored three times in 5:20 during the second period, with the goals arriving at 0:23, 3:18 and 5:43. Only the first was on the power play; the next two came at even strength.
His burst pushed Dallas from 2-0 to 4-0 before Kyrou’s conversion interrupted it, and the Stars still led 5-3 after Chychrun’s late goal.
This is where the game’s arithmetic becomes more useful than the final score alone. Washington went 2-for-3 on the power play. Dallas went 1-for-2.
