Oliver Moore's injury further weakens Blackhawks' center corps in loss to Stars

DALLAS — Blackhawks rookie Sam Rinzel had just begun celebrating his third career NHL goal Sunday when he realized only three teammates were in the huddle, not four.

Seconds before the goal, fellow rookie Oliver Moore appeared to injure his right knee on an awkward crash into the end-boards. The celebration stopped so Rinzel could help Moore hobble off the ice and down to the locker room.

Moore’s injury further weakened the Hawks’ already-slim group of centers and took the wind out of the team’s sails. The early two-goal lead Rinzel gave the Hawks eventually slipped away in a 4-3 overtime loss to the Stars.

After the game, coach Jeff Blashill said Moore won’t play Monday against the Mammoth but didn’t offer a more detailed update.

All four of the Stars' goals were scored around the net in scrappy, ugly fashion. It was an ugly game in general.

Hawks goalie Arvid Soderblom, making his second consecutive start because of Spencer Knight’s illness, made some difficult saves but probably should have made a few more straightforward ones, including on Stars defenseman Miro Heiskanen’s tip-in winner 22 seconds into overtime.

‘‘I would just say you’re going to give that [shot] up, and it went in,’’ Blashill said.

The Hawks earned a point after Connor Bedard, who was stymied for most of the game, scored from Fort Worth — 54 feet out, technically — with 1:20 left in regulation. It was the Hawks’ first goal with their goalie pulled all season. They had been the only team without one.

But nobody reasonably could argue they deserved the full two points. The Stars finished with a 32-17 advantage in shots on goal after holding the Hawks without a shot for nearly the whole second period.

‘‘At times, the ice tilted their way on us, so then you’re defending a little bit more than you want to,’’ Blashill said. ‘‘But I also thought we passed up on some shots. We’ve got to make sure we have a good shooting mentality.’’

The Hawks’ lack of center depth after trading Jason Dickinson and Nick Foligno might become a really significant problem without Moore. They have gone an atrocious 31-for-97 at the faceoff dot in their last two games, for example.

They did call up and play rookie forward Nick Lardis on Sunday, but he’s not a center and barely exceeded 10 minutes of ice time even in an 11-forward rotation.

‘‘Coming back here now, it feels a lot less stressful,’’ Lardis said. ‘‘[I want to] just show that I can be trusted by the coaches more. It goes for every young player starting their pro career, but [it’s about] being trusted as a two-way player and continuing to show my consistency and my strengths.’’

Then again, the Hawks’ inexperience at every position group is intentional. It’s a feature, not a bug. It might be a disadvantage in the short term, but management hopes giving so many young guys so much responsibility will pay off down the road.

There’s no denying the fact the youngsters rapidly are accumulating experience in close-game scenarios. Discounting empty-netters, five of the Hawks’ six games since the Olympic break have been decided by one goal. The only exception was their blowout road victory against the Mammoth.

The catch is, the Hawks have lost all five of those one-goal games.

‘‘It’s not the most comfortable thing always, but you learn from experience,’’ said defenseman Matt Grzelcyk, now the Hawks’ oldest player at 32.

‘‘Hopefully [the kids] can take these next 20 games to heart and build toward the future, for next season, [and] not just wait until the offseason to do that.’’