Kris Letang has 33 shots on goal in eight games this season. That's the most of any NHL defenseman and projects to 338 over 82 games, a total that would obliterate his career-high of 236 set in 2010-11.
Of those 338, roughly 337 figure to come from longer range than the most important one of the five Letang got off during the Penguins' 4-2 victory against the Stars Friday night at PPG Paints Arena. That would be the one he slid under the right pad of Dallas goalie Anton Khudobin at 6:34 of the third period to break a 1-1 tie and give the Penguins a lead they never surrendered en route to their fifth consecutive victory.
Because he is a defenseman, Letang gets many of his shots from close to the blue line. But after deking past Dallas forwards Joe Pavelski and Tyler Seguin in the left circle, Letang made his way to within about a foot of the crease before pushing the puck past Khudobin for his third goal of the season:
"I was able to just kind of fake the shot and get (Pavelski and Seguin) to go down," he said. "I think I had to do it twice. I was trying to find a backdoor play, but they played man-on-man, so that gave me room to go to the net."
That's not an area in which Letang operates very often, but he stayed patient and didn't rush his shot as he closed in on Khudobin, waiting for him to lift his pad enough that a puck could sneak by.
"It was certainly a goal-scorer's goal," Mike Sullivan said. "It was a terrific play."
Letang would get goal No. 4 when he hit an empty net with 21.4 seconds to go in regulation, courtesy of a feed from Patric Hornqvist.
That assist was Hornqvist's third point of the night. His second proved to be the game-winning goal, as he directed a Brian Dumoulin shot past Khudobin at 10:20 of the third period.
Hornqvist picked a good time to have his most productive night of the season, because Dallas became the first opponent to hold Sidney Crosby without a point this season and Jake Guentzel failed to score a goal for the first time in five games.
Although Crosby and Guentzel both could have gotten goals in the opening period -- Crosby had a quality chance on the first shift of the evening, while Guentzel was thwarted when a shot from point-blank range hit the shaft of Khodubin's stick 17 1/2 minutes in -- neither team generated all that many scoring opportunities during the first two periods.
Fact is, most of the first 40 minutes were about as energetic and entertaining as a quilting bee.
A preseason quilting bee.
"It was a bit of a slow start, for sure" Matt Murray said. "It didn't seem like there was much (open) ice out there. Not a lot of chances for either side. They play a pretty structured game, defensively, and I thought we did the same."
Murray faced only 24 shots, but two of those came when he denied Tyler Seguin during a sequence shortly before Jared McCann scored at 17:36 of the middle period to wipe out a 1-0 Dallas lead.
"We did a pretty good job most of the night in defending pretty hard," Sullivan said. "We limited their chances. But in that second period, they got a couple of flurries, and Matt came up big for us. That's what he does. He makes key saves at key times."
Murray has done that often enough through the early weeks of the season to go 5-2, with a 2.56 goals-against average and .914 save percentage.
"He's been stellar," Marcus Pettersson said. "I'm looking forward to seeing him continue like that."
Petterson probably should count on seeing Letang send pucks at the opposing net on a regular basis, too, because Letang said he has made a conscious effort to shoot when the opportunity arises.
"Especially with the power play, with the group we have right now, we try to simplify things and maybe shoot more," he said. "And in previous years, you look at guys like Brent Burns and Erik Karlsson and they're shooting the puck a lot, and it's paying dividends. They're scoring, or they create offense from it."
Even if they don't go all the way to the net to do it.
• McCann, who missed the Penguins' 3-2 overtime victory against the Avalanche Wednesday because of an unspecified lower-body injury, returned to the lineup and steered a Pettersson shot past Khudobin for his third goal of the season. McCann logged 14:30 of ice time and recorded three shots, a hit and three blocked shots. "I thought Jared had a good game," Sullivan said. "He has a nose for the net. He can score."
• The Stars, who took eventual Stanley Cup champion St. Louis to seven games during Round 2 of the playoffs this spring, was widely projected as a contender for first place in the Central Division and perhaps for a Cup. And even though Dallas is now 1-7-1, the Penguins insist the Stars are a formidable group. "Those things happen," Pettersson said. "They're a good team. They're a desperate team. You could tell they were anxious to get a win. I think they're going to turn it around."
• Letang has accounted for four of the five goals the Penguins have gotten from their defense this season, but Sullivan believes other members of that group can make a significant contribution to the offense as the season progresses. "When you look at our defense corps and how it's built, we have the ability to generate offense from that group of six," he said. "(Letang), obviously, is an elite defenseman. Justin Schultz is a real good offensive defenseman. But we think some of these other guys have an offensive dimension to their game, as well."
• Dominik Kahun received the second assist on Hornqvist's game-winner, just his second point of the season.
• Dallas dominated the Penguins on faceoffs, winning 29 of 48. Crosby, who went 12-8, was the only Penguins player to win more than he lost.
• Even though he failed to get a goal, Guentzel extended his scoring streak to a career-best seven games by assisting on Letang's empty-netter.
• Every victory during the Penguins' current winning streak -- the longest active one in the league -- has come against Western Conference opponents. The Penguins will face another of those when Vegas visits PPG Arena Saturday at 7:08 p.m.
THE ESSENTIALS
• Boxscore
THE INJURIES
• Evgeni Malkin (unspecified, lower-body) is on Long-Term Injured Reserve
• Nick Bjugstad (unspecified, lower-body) is on injured reserve
• Alex Galchenyuk (unspecified, lower-body) is on injured reserve
• Bryan Rust (hand) is on LTIR
• Zach Trotman (sports hernia surgery) is on LTIR
THE LINEUPS
Sullivan’s lines and pairings:
Jake Guentzel -- Sidney Crosby -- Dominik Simon
Dominik Kahun -- Jared McCann -- Patric Hornqvist
Zach Aston-Reese -- Teddy Blueger -- Brandon Tanev
Adam Johnson -- Joseph Blandisi -- Sam Lafferty
Brian Dumoulin -- Kris Letang
Marcus Pettersson -- Justin Schultz
Jack Johnson -- John Marino
And for Jim Montgomery's Stars:
Jason Dickinson -- Tyler Seguin -- Alexander Radulov
Jamie Benn -- Roope Hintz -- Corey Perry
Mattias Janmark -- Radek Faksa -- Joe Pavelski
Andrew Cogliano -- Justin Dowling -- Denis Gurianov
Esa Lindell -- John Klingberg
Andrej Sekera -- Miro Hieskanen
Jamie Olesiak -- Taylor Fedun
THE SCHEDULE
The Penguins will face the Golden Knights Saturday at 7:08 p.m. at PPG Paints Arena before having a scheduled day off Sunday. They canceled their morning skate for Saturday.
THE COVERAGE
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MATT SUNDAY GALLERY
Penguins vs. Stars, PPG Paints Arena, Oct. 18, 2019 -- MATT SUNDAY / DKPS