The Dallas Stars picked up a much-needed 3-1 win over Edmonton in Game 2 of the Western Conference Final, tying the series at one win apiece. The Stars and Oilers will now travel to Edmonton for Games 3 and 4 of the series, which will take place on Monday and Wednesday respectively.

Mason Marchment's goal at 3:41 of the third period broke a 1-1 tie. The goal was Marchment's first since Game 1 of the first round, although Marchment also missed six games with an undisclosed injury.

TIP DRILL FOR MASON MARCHMENT! 🌟 pic.twitter.com/2buj7GrUAZ

— Sportsnet (@Sportsnet) May 26, 2024

Jamie Benn opened the scoring for Dallas, with Connor Brown tying the game for Edmonton less than a minute later. Esa Lindell scored an empty-net goal. Benn registered an assist on Lindell's goal, giving him four points over his last three games.

Jake Oettinger turned aside 28 of 29 shots he faced, registering his third consecutive quality start. He has an outstanding 2.04 GAA and .922 SV% during the playoffs, picking up quality starts in 12 of his 15 games.

Dallas is where they are in spite of Joe Pavelski hitting a major slump. Last season, he was Playoff Pavelski with nine goals and 14 points in 14 games. This season, just a single goal and four points in 15 games. The slump has gotten so bad that Pavelski was replaced by Tyler Seguin on the top power play. Seguin has been a much more reliable option during the playoffs, most recently scoring two goals in Game 1 and taking 10 shots in the two games against Edmonton.

Roope Hintz was out of the lineup again for Game 2 because of an upper-body injury. He has now missed four games, although the fact that he was a game-time decision means that he could still return for Game 3.

Adam Henrique was also out of the lineup for Game 2. He has now missed seven consecutive games with an ankle injury, although he was also considered a game-time decision.

Since his two-game break during the Vancouver series, Stuart Skinner has been playing much better. Skinner has allowed no more than two goals in each of his last four games, picking up quality starts in three of them, including Game 2.

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Yesterday I discussed the success I had with one of my fantasy teams when I had decided to go full Zero G. One takeaway that I want to emphasize from that is that scoring system matters with Zero G. If you don't need to fill goalie categories and just need to earn points, then there are many different ways you could earn those necessary points through roster construction. My strategy was to go heavy on skaters and light on goaltending, since game-by-game goalie points have a much higher variance than skater scoring in this league. Goalies also have the potential to earn significant negative points with a really bad start in this league, cutting into scoring totals.

Another takeaway from yesterday is the use of in-season waiver-wire pickups and even streaming. My two starting goalies at the end of the season were Joey Daccord and Anthony Stolarz. Daccord was fifth in goals saved above average for the season (17.38 GSAA) in spite of being drafted in very few leagues. Stolarz was a stream for the fantasy playoffs, finishing with some outstanding ratios for the season (2.03 GAA, .925 SV%). Strong 1A/backup goalies could be better options for your team than weak high-volume starters simply because they do less damage to your team.

Team 2: Partial Zero G

This is a Yahoo head-to-head categories league with 14 teams. There are 10 scoring categories, with three of them goaltending-related (W, GAA, and SV%.) Each team has a minimum of two goalie appearances per week. Each team also has a maximum of five adds per week and 60 adds per season. Nothing else is out of the ordinary.

If you currently participate in a head-to-head categories league, you may feel you have no choice but to use a high pick or two on goaltending. Some leagues may lean hard toward goaltending, which makes drafting at least one strong goalie essential. It's rare to see a league consist of 50 percent or more goaltending categories, but there may be enough goaltending categories to discourage punting goalies entirely. Minimum goalie starts are also a factor, so having more goalie starts will matter to some degree if wins and saves (not save percentage) are categories. 

My draft picks were as follows:

Vitek Vanecek, 6^th round, 82^nd overall

Joseph Woll, 12^th round, 166^th overall

Jordan Binnington, 17^th round, 227^th overall

I would rate the effectiveness of these goalies in reverse order of where they were drafted. Binnington was the only goalie I stuck with for the entire season, although Woll was on my roster for most of the season. No matter the league, my draft strategy always involves picking at least one goalie in the middle to late rounds, with Woll and Binnington counting as those goalies for this team. Binnington wasn't a Vezina Trophy candidate by any means, but he provided exceptional value and was remarkably consistent for a pick beyond 200. Ryan Brudner describes how much Binnington could be relied upon from a True Goalie Value perspective in his latest Geek of the Week.  

I won't hide the fact that Vanecek was a truly awful pick, though. I dropped him in January for Ukko-Pekka Luukkonen, who was a much more reliable option. I probably waited much longer than I should have, as Vanecek had a 3.31 GAA and .882 SV% at the time I dropped him. I think I kept him as long as I did because a 14-7-2 record covered up his poor ratios. My two reasons for drafting Vanecek? 1) I was big on New Jersey entering the season, and he seemed like their best goaltending option, and 2) 12 goalies were already off the board by the time I picked him, which meant that most teams had at least one goalie already. I could have used the pick on a reliable scorer like Chris Kreider, Bo Horvat, or Mark Scheifele, who were all drafted shortly after.

Even with an anchor like Vanecek on my team for half the season, I managed to cut my losses early enough for me to make the playoffs. The add/drop exchange of Vanecek for Luukkonen in mid-January might have been my best decision of the season. After I added UPL, he posted 17 wins with a much more respectable 2.44 GAA and .913 SV%. That matched Binnington's save percentage for the entire season, although Binnington's 2.84 GAA was closer to the league average.

I began to stream both goalies and skaters more frequently once the playoffs arrived, managing to scratch and claw my way to the league final. However, I lost in the league final for the second consecutive season. Even though I couldn't quite attain that elusive league championship in this league, Semyon Varlamov was a solid choice as a stream for the fantasy playoffs. During the month of April, Varlamov won all five of his regular-season games while posting a 1.59 GAA and .945 SV%, leading the Islanders into the real-life playoffs.

I lost my head-to-head matchup in all three goaltending categories simply because my opponent had outstanding goaltending during that scoring period (6 W, 1.64 GAA, .944 SV%). His star goalie during the final? Charlie Lindgren, another Zero G example as an in-season waiver-wire pickup who grabbed the starting goalie job in Washington and won four of his last five games. If my opponent grabs a waiver-wire goalie that goes on a heater in the most critical matchup of the season, there's not much I can do about that. Yet if I had drafted just one more scorer instead of Vanecek, maybe I would have fared better than splitting the scoring categories with my opponent.

Over the last 30 days of the regular season only, the top 10 goalies in this particular Yahoo league were (in order) Jake Oettinger, Frederik Andersen, Varlamov, David Rittich, Logan Thompson, Jesper Wallstedt, Kevin Lankinen, Justus Annunen, Laurent Brossoit, and Anthony Stolarz.

Over the last 14 days of the regular season only, the top 10 goalies in this particular Yahoo league were (in order) Varlamov, Lindgren, Andersen, Connor Hellebuyck, Wallstedt, Stolarz, Igor Shesterkin, Brossoit, Oettinger, and Lankinen.

You have your studs like Oettinger, Hellebuyck, and Shesterkin in there. But look at how many backups are in there! If you're not confident in your goalies heading into your fantasy playoffs, you need to consider streaming for hot goalies and good matchups. Remember, you're not trying to win an entire season with them. You're just trying to win a week or two.

Ryan Brudner, our Geek of the Week writer, will be writing a future article on Zero G from a True Goalie Value stats perspective. For more on True Goalie Value stats, see his Geek of the Week from May 19. I've already sent my team transactions to Ryan for his analysis, but you can still send yours to him on his X account @fantasycheddar. I'm looking forward to what he has in store.

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