Jason Robertson needed a little more than five minutes on Tuesday night to turn a one-goal game into a rout. The Dallas Stars then spent the rest of the evening finding out how much of that cushion they would need.
Robertson scored three straight goals in a 5:20 span early in the second period, and Dallas held off a late Washington push to beat the Capitals 6-5 at Capital One Arena. He added an assist in the third for a four-point night, and the three goals lifted him to eight on the season, level with Mikko Rantanen for the team lead.
Only two natural hat tricks in Stars history have come quicker, according to DallasStars.com's Mike Heika: Jamie Benn's 5:17 burst in 2018 and Tom McCarthy's 5:15 back in 1984.
Three goals, three looks
Joel Kiviranta's backhand was the only goal of the first, and the Stars began the middle period with the man advantage. Robertson cashed it 23 seconds into the period, gliding into the left circle unchallenged and beating goaltender Logan Thompson on the short side.
At 3:18, Arttu Hyry dropped the puck to him along the right wing. Robertson stepped around a Jakob Chychrun check on the boards and picked the far side. At 5:43 he finished the set from the left point, his shot slipping through a crowd in front to make it 4-0. Thompson had allowed four goals on 11 shots, and Charlie Lindgren replaced him.
"A couple of times you're just feeling it and you stick with it. It's nice when it goes in," Robertson said afterward. "It just happened so quickly, you didn't even have time to digest it."
The part that got loud
Washington didn't fold. Jordan Kyrou scored on a power play, and after Rantanen restored a four-goal lead with the 800th point of his career, Boone Jenner and Chychrun scored late in the period to make it 5-3 at the second intermission. Chychrun's goal also came on the man advantage.
