Pete DeBoer’s explanation for pulling Jake Oettinger in elimination game falls flat

Just 8:07 into the Dallas Stars‘ 6-3 loss to the Edmonton Oilers on Thursday night, Jake Oettinger took a seat on the bench next to rinkside reporter Ray Ferraro. Pete DeBoer’s decision to pull Oettinger with his team’s season on the line raised a few questions, and he provided an explanation after the game.

The Stars had a miserable time trying to play with the lead in these playoffs, falling behind first in 15 of their 18 games. Thursday night’s Game 5 was especially bad with the Oilers scoring on each of their first two shots.

Oettinger didn’t bear the brunt of the blame on either goal, but DeBoer pulled his franchise goalie in favor of backup Casey DeSmith anyway. In his postgame press conference, DeBoer explained that he was trying to spark his team, but he was also concerned with Oettinger’s playoff history against the Oilers.

“Anytime you pull a goalie, the reasoning is always to try and spark your group, so that was the No. 1 reason,” DeBoer said. “We had talked endlessly in this series about trying to play with the lead. Obviously, we were in a 2-0 hole right away. You know, I didn’t take that lightly, and I didn’t blame it all on Jake.

“But the reality is, if you go back to last year’s playoffs, he’s lost six of seven games to Edmonton. We gave up two shots and two goals in an elimination game.

“It was partly to spark our team and wake them up, and partly knowing the status quo had not been working, and it was a pretty big sample size.”

Just moments after taking the ice, DeSmith allowed a third goal when a soft shot from Jeff Skinner snuck through his legs to make it 3-0. The other two goals DeSmith allowed — a showstopper by Connor McDavid and a bad bounce on an intended pass from Evander Kane — probably weren’t his fault.

Despite DeBoer’s answer, Stars fans may forever wonder what would have happened if Oettinger remained in net.

Does he stop Skinner’s shot? Does he come up with a game-saving denial of McDavid? Does he react a half-second faster to a bad deflection off Esa Lindell’s skate?

DeBoer cited a seven-game sample size as his reasoning for benching Oettinger. How about a 174-game sample size? That’s the number of games Oettinger has played over the last three seasons, and his 48.1 goals saved above average in that span rank sixth in the NHL, per Natural Stat Trick.

Regardless of Oettinger’s postseason history against Edmonton, Dallas is counting on him to be the guy to win these types of games. They’re certainly paying him to be that guy, and he should have been given the chance to recover after a shaky start.

This postseason, Oettinger has saved 3.76 goals above average, even when factoring in Thursday night’s debacle. Without Oettinger, the Stars don’t even get this far. Only four teams averaged fewer than the Stars’ 2.5 goals per game, and three of them were eliminated in five games in the first round.

Dallas needed a spark long before Game 5, but it never came. Pulling Oettinger was never the answer, unless he was going to play forward and score a couple of goals. DeBoer should have left his franchise goalie in net. Instead, he went down with him watching from the sidelines.