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At only 21 years old, Wyatt Johnston has added yet another impressive Game 7 performance to his repertoire.
Just when it seemed the Dallas Stars were down and out – trailing 2-0 with under 13 minutes left in the third period in the deciding game of their First Round series against the Colorado Avalanche – Johnston put the exclamation point on a 4-2 comeback triumph that brought everyone out of their seats at American Airlines Center.
After a pair of goals from new teammate Stars Mikko Rantanen, playing against the Finnish forward’s former club, Johnston netted the game-winner by ripping the puck from a challenging sharp angle home with 3:56 left on the clock.
With three seconds remaining, Rantanen sealed his hat trick and the win with an empty-netter to insure the Stars were headed onto the Second Round.
The Stars are now set for date with the Winnipeg Jets and will open their series on May 7 on the road.
“Just a great feeling waking up knowing we won that game and the series,” Johnston told NHLPA.com the day after the win.
“Obviously, did not want our season to end, so it’s exciting knowing we’re still playing,”
The 23rd overall pick of the Stars in 2021 deflected much of the praise and instead spoke glowingly of his teammates – a group that battled through the absence of key players, Jason Robertson and Miro Heiskanen, in the First Round.
“I learnt about the resiliency and character of this team,” said Johnston, who signed a five-year contract extension in March.
“Those are two things I knew we have lots of but it’s super impressive what we were able to accomplish [on Saturday] given the circumstances.”
Johnston marveled at the play of many, including Rantanen.
The standout forward, who was traded from Colorado to Carolina in January and then to Dallas in March, took his performance to another level for the Stars against his former team.
On Saturday night, Rantanen became the first player in NHL history to score a hat trick in the third period of a Stanley Cup Game 7.
“He is just overall a super impressive player,” said Johnston. “Got to know him well playing against him a ton, but really got to know his game once he got here.
“I think his passing is what impressed me the most. He’s an amazing passer, which I didn’t know how good it was when playing against him.”
Johnston had equally high praise for the character of the entire Stars lineup.
“Everyone banded together and worked hard throughout all the ups and downs in the opening round – everybody made a difference.
Including Johnston, who has a knack for coming up clutch in winner-take-all games.
In 2023, in a Second Round series against the Seattle Kraken, Johnston lit the lamp from a tough angle with less than eight minutes left in the third period to give the Stars a 2-0 advantage. The Kraken scored late to make it a one-goal game, but Dallas held on, and Johnston was credited with the game-winning marker.
With the goal, the centreman put his name in the record books as the youngest player in NHL history to score a series-clinching goal in a Game 7. He achieved the feat one day after celebrating his 20th birthday.
On May 13 last year, one day before he turned 21, Johnston joined Wayne Gretzky as one of only two players to have notched a power-play goal and short-handed goal in a playoff contest before the age of 21.
On Saturday night, he was back in the record books again, this time as the first player in league history to score a series-clinching goal in multiple Game 7s at age 22 or younger.
Dallas bench boss Peter DeBoer, who became the first head coach or manager in NHL, MLB or NBA history to achieve nine career Game 7 wins heaped praise on Johnston after his latest big-game heroics.
“So clutch,” DeBoer told the media. “I don’t know if you saw the replay, but the pass jammed him, and the skill to make that shot at that time of the game at that age, he’s special. He’s a special player. He wants to be in those situations, and he rises to the occasion. You can’t teach that stuff.”
What Johnston does know is how to put on a masterclass in Game 7s.
