The Hat Trick: Mammoth claim crucial victory with complete effort against Dallas Stars

Mar 16, 2026 , 10:06 PM

Comments
Vitek Vanecek, Utah Mammoth....

Vitek Vanecek #41 of the Utah Mammoth in action asj at SAP Center on November 18, 2025 in San Jose, California. (Photo by Ezra Shaw/Getty Images)

(Photo by Ezra Shaw/Getty Images)

COLE BAGLEY


Utah Mammoth Insider

SALT LAKE CITY – After dropping four straight games during the more favorable stretch of their remaining schedule, the Utah Mammoth shocked the Dallas Stars on Monday night to get back into the win column.

Rather than folding under the pressure of a playoff push, Utah simply wanted is more as they played as a collective unit to pick up their most important win to this point in the season.

Here are the key takeaways from Utah’s 6-3 victory over the Stars.

Some well-timed fights got Utah involved after a rough start

There’s an art to dropping one’s gloves in the National Hockey League.

Not just in terms of the actual technique but deciding exactly when to grab an opponent’s sweater and start dancing.

Against the Stars, both Brandon Tanev and Jack McBain picked the right time to fight as they recognized the need for a collective spark and started throwing haymakers.

The result of the two well-timed fights?

A complete shift in momentum as Clayton Keller tied the game just moments later from an impossible angle to get Utah on the board.

Dropping the gloves is all about timing.

If a team is leading by two or three goals and an opponent starts chirping them to go, they’re going to say no.

Doesn’t make sense to give a team any energy or momentum when firmly in the lead.

But as Tanev and McBain demonstrated in Dallas, if a player can get someone to drop ’em when it’s still fairly close and the team is in desperate need of a spark, that’s the perfect time to fight.

Utah’s PK was perfect as they held the hottest unit in the league scoreless

Facing the hottest special teams’ unit in the league as of late, the Mammoth were burdened with a tall task in Dallas.

As a squad that had allowed four power play goals over their previous four games, having to stop the second-best power play in the league to this point in the season seemed nearly impossible.

But somehow, someway, the Mammoth were up to the challenge as they consistently disrupted the Stars approach despite three opportunities over the course of the game.

As a unit, Dallas often operates in an umbrella system as opposed to the more popular bumper.

In an umbrella, teams will generally place one player at the point, one on each wing and the remaining two on both sides of the goaltender.

This allows the power play to spread the defense while blasting shots from the wings with bodies in front to provide screens and clean up juicy rebounds.

On the other side of the ice, effectively killing the umbrella requires a high level of awareness, active sticks, a strong net front presence and a good goaltender.

For Utah, they executed that scheme to perfection as the forwards disrupted passes, defenseman battled for position near the crease and Vitek Vanecek stood on his head with 27 saves on 30 shots and zero power plays goals relinquished.

Notably, Utah also exposed the Stars umbrella on McBain’s short-handed goal.

With only one player positioned near the point, the umbrella is susceptible to odd man rushes if the puck is not cleanly kept at the line.

Once the puck exited the zone, McBain quickly pounced which led to a breakaway that he buried five-hole.

“It’s been a while, unfortunately,” McBain said after netting his first goal since February 13.

“I think I’ve done a lot of good things. I’ve been getting a lot of shots and chances. But sometimes it doesn’t go your way. But I was just trying to stick with it mentally. It was good to see that one go tonight.”

To beat Dallas these days, a team must be locked in and opportunistic on special teams.

Against the Stars, Utah happened to be both at each end which helped them get the job done.

A complete, all-around approach secured Utah’s biggest win of the season

After four straight losses amidst a fragile playoff push, Utah had no choice but to get back in the win column.

No excuses, no room for error, just find a way to get two points.

Unfortunately, that meant they’d have to defy the odds by beating a Dallas Stars team on a 15-game point streak.

Fortunately, a complete effort from every skater in a Mammoth sweater got the job done.

“Everybody was good tonight. Everybody contributed in certain ways. Big fights from Bainer and Tanny. I think we had physicality throughout our lineup…I think everybody chipped in today,” Head coach Andre Tourigny explained.

As Tourigny noted, it required a complete effort to beat Dallas.

In addition to the fights from McBain and Tanev, Vanecek was superb, special teams were nearly perfect, and 11 total Mammoth skaters ended the night with a point while all six goals were scored by a different player.

“Great job by [Vitek] Vanecek. I liked our special teams a lot,” Tourigny said. “Our PK [penalty kill] was rock solid. The most important thing, in my opinion, Dallas is a really good team, and they were pushing hard and tough to contain, and even then, we bend but didn’t break. We were solid mentally.”

“We talk a lot about mental toughness and we stayed with it, even when they scored first, and so on and so forth. We got a fortunate stick early in the game, we know that, but still our game got better during the game and throughout the game against a really good team. I am proud of the boys.”

Utah is reaching a point where there’s very little room for error.

Unless you’re north of 90 points at this point in the season, no playoff spot is guaranteed, and it will be a dogfight down the stretch.

For the Mammoth, their goal is to finally get in.

The only way they’re going to achieve that is if they continue to play a complete game as a team every single night.

Tonight, they proved they’re fully capable of that against one of the best NHL squads.

Over the final 14 matchups, the key to getting in will be whether or not they can consistently replicate that performance.

RELATED STORIES

What’s next for the Utah Mammoth?

The Utah Mammoth will conclude their short two game road trip against the Vegas Golden Knights on Thursday night at 8:00 p.m. MT.

The game will be available on Hulu & ESPN+.

All Mammoth games will also be broadcast live on the KSL Sports Zone (97.5 FM/1280 AM).

Cole Bagley is the Utah Mammoth insider for KSL Sports. Keep up with him on X here. You can hear Cole break down the team on KSL Sports Zone and KSL 5 TV.

Take us with you, wherever you go.

Download the new & improved KSL Sports app from Utah’s sports leader. You can stream live radio, video and stay up to date on all of your favorite teams.

JOIN THE DISCUSSION

Utah Hockey Forum

JOIN THE DISCUSSION