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Dallas Stars center Mavrik Bourque (22) skates back to the bench as Minnesota Wild goaltender Jesper Wallstedt (30) and defenseman Brock Faber (7) celebrate their last goal, an empty netter during the third period in Game 6 of a first-round NHL hockey playoff series in St. Paul, Minnesota, April 30, 2026. The Stars lost the game. 5-2, and the series. (Tom Fox/The Dallas Morning News)
The Stars fell to the Minnesota Wild on Thursday to end their season in the first-round of the playoffs, much earlier than it's ended the past three seasons.
A banged-up group answered questions about the series and the end of the season and what lies ahead after the game, along with a jubilant group of Minnesota Wild players relishing what's likely the biggest win in that franchise's history.
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Minnesota Wild right wing Vladimir Tarasenko (91) drops to his knees after scoring on Dallas Stars goaltender Jake Oettinger (29) during the second period in Game 6 of a first-round NHL hockey playoff series in St. Paul, Minnesota, April 30, 2026. Joining in the celebration was Wild center Yakov Trenin (13) who had an assist on the play. (Tom Fox/The Dallas Morning News)
Check out quotes below from players and coaches on both sides after Game 6.
RELATED:Stars' ill-fated series vs. Wild felt like one long missed opportunity for team with Cup hopes
Stars veteran Matt Duchene
On how he saw the series: “We played hard. It felt like every time we made a mistake, it would end up in our net. It wasn’t for a lack of trying to score. We just didn’t get the bounces that we needed, and they did at times, and at big times. That’s a heck of a team. They played really well. And I thought tonight was a pretty even game. They had the first, we had the second, and the third was as toss-up. They just got the last bounce off a skate and in. Kind of sums up the series. Obviously, it’s really tough right now, but all in all, I’m so grateful to be part of this team and know we’ll be back better than ever from this."
On if the Stars' Stanley Cup window is still open:“Absolutely. Everyone’s locked up for a long time. All our young guys are just going to get one more year older and just continue to get more experienced. Us older guys, we’ll keep on pushing and keep our level up where it is. We don’t plan on going anywhere and tapering off. Sometimes, it takes a few times knocking on the door before you can break through. We have a really good team, really good group, and we’ll keep trying to get better. It’s always tough to swallow. It doesn’t matter when you lose when you have a team that you believe can win. You feel like it’s a missed opportunity. We’ll sit in that for a little bit, but we’ll pick ourselves up, dust ourselves off and keep moving forward.”
Stars defenseman Miro Heiskanen
Is another year without the cup frustrating, concerning? "It’s frustrating, for sure. I don’t know if it’s concerning. I think we have a great team and we have been close. We’re not going to win every year. It’s a hard thing to win. We have to learn from this and get better. I think that’s the only way. You’re not going to win every year, but obviously you want to get to the finals and get the Cup. But everyone else wants to do that, too. There’s great teams out there. Just have to get better."
On missing Roope Hintz: "He’s a huge part of our team. In both ends of the ice. Just a reliable guy. Obviously we miss him every game he’s not playing and would have been nice to have him, but that’s how it goes in hockey, there’s injuries. Just have to play without him and I think we still had a chance to win. We weren’t good enough to do that."
Stars coach Glen Gulutzan
Was this game similar to the series at large? "I did see the series kind of in this game. I know lots of you are going to go to five-on-five scoring, but reality is, I think territory-wise in this series, I think it was pretty even to give us the territorial advantage, but we didn't defend well enough. The chances we gave up were a lot higher quality than what we were getting with the territory that we had. So we tried to reset a little bit today with our identity getting back to being a lot more stingy in our efforts. ... Give them credit they did a lot of great things. But if you look at today, there were some things that we gave them..."
On how hard of a loss this is knowing they were a Cup contender:"The thing is, I would say that they are too, and we are too, and there's probably six to eight of us in the league, and somebody wins and somebody loses so that's a hard pill to swallow, especially for all the work our guys have put in and how much character we have in our team and with the regular season success you had, you expect more. But just goes to show you how hard it is to win."
Wild forward Matt Boldy
On Quinn Hughes' stellar night: "Yeah I don't want to be too nice with him sitting right next to me. What he's capable of doing as a hockey player is pretty special. I think you see that. Ever since he's come to Minnesota the jump that we made as a team in every aspect of our game has been better with him being on our team. When one player has that much of an impact and leads the way he does and steps up in the biggest moments it's pretty special to have him on the ice and have him have the puck."
Wild coach John Hynes
On the difference in the series: "I just think that sometimes when you coach different teams, it’s such a player-driven team. Like these guys are really close, they’re really tight. They were willing to learn some lessons from the games. I would say that their commitment, whether it was in meetings, the attention to detail, how they prepared, how they stuck together, they’re a group that, they play for each other. They don’t play with each other. And I think that’s a big difference. When you have a group of guys that’s committed to each other the way that they are, it winds up where you get such a committed game."
Wild goalie Jesper Wallstedt
On Hughes, challenging Oettinger:"I was happy that [Hughes] started to shoot off the goal. We were talking about it the whole series. We knew their D was going to try to either block shots or they were standing off to the side. Obviously, Oetter is awesome goalie. He’s probably going to make a lot of saves that we shoot straight up on him. So especially on bad angle shots, if we could look off the back and try to shoot it off skates or bodies, we knew that would be good."
On what he learned about the playoffs: "That it’s pretty freaking fun. It’s completely different from the regular season. It’s been four years since I was in playoffs. It’s been so much fun. It’s so different. I don’t know. It’s different. ... I looked back [at the fans behind the glass] and I saw someone crying back there. Everyone was just so happy. The building was so loud that my ears started hurting. It was amazing. I’m so happy for our fan base."
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