FRSICO, Texas — Tyler Seguin got sidetracked on his way to bed when he checked the scores from the two games on the West Coast that would determine who the Dallas Stars would face in the first round of the NHL playoffs.
“I went in the living room just to see what was going on,” Seguin said in the Stars locker room Friday.
Matt Duchene was watching as well from his home late Thursday night, and kept waking up his wife to tell her who the Stars would be playing. That changed a couple of times between the Las Vegas Golden Knights and Los Angeles Kings.
In the end, the top seed in the Western Conference wound up with a playoff rematch against defending Stanley Cup champion Vegas. The Golden Knights last year wrapped up the Western Conference Final with a Game 6 win in Dallas, where the first-round series opens Monday night.
About the same time the Knights’ 4-1 home loss to Anaheim ended Thursday night, the Kings were giving up a two-goal lead at home. Chicago scored three times in a five-minute span early in the third period and led until the Kings got even with 1:21 left in regulation - on a power-play goal with a 6-4 advantage after pulling their goalie for an extra attacker.
“They were crazy games. There were different points in both of those games where you were sure it was going to be one team, and then the other,” said Dallas coach Pete DeBoer, who will coach against the Golden Knights in the playoffs for the fourth time - and was their coach for the franchise’s only other two postseason trips.
Los Angeles went on to win with a goal only six seconds into overtime, which was just minutes before midnight in Texas. But just getting the tie in regulation secured the point the Kings needed for third place in the Pacific Division, and dropped Vegas to the second wild card in the West.
“That was a gong show at the end of the LA game,” Duchene said. “Going into the night, you think it’s LA, then you think it’s Vegas and then you think it’s LA, and then you see it’s Vegas again. … It was a weird evening. I usually stay away from that roller coaster and just go to bed. But, last night I started watching one of the games and I got sucked in.”
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