The Dallas Stars: America’s (hockey) Team. Sometimes dominant, sometimes horse excrement, consistently inconsistent. Let’s preview the Stars’ season:
Notable Players In: Corey Perry, Joe Pavelski, Andrej Sekera
Notable Players Out: Mats Zuccarello, Jason Spezza, Marc Methot
First Key Game: St. Louis Blues – October 5th
Odds to win the division
17:4 (t-3rd overall) (via Betway)
Is this a bet worth taking?
Nope. The Central division has had its fair share of detractors over the past decade, but last season five of its teams went to the playoffs. It looks like a strong division again this season and the Stars will find it tough to finish top of the pack.
Keys To The Season
Story to watch
Can the Stars progress in the playoffs? Dallas surprised everyone by knocking out the conference favourites Nashville in the first round last season, before falling to eventual Stanley Cup champs St. Louis in seven games. That second round exit made a lot of people reassess just how good the Stars can be, and with the names that have joined the team recently, there’s potential for Dallas to keep going this year.
This is the season that the Stars make a real run for the cup. All the changes in roster are geared towards a cup-run and coach Jim Montgomery‘s team need to make it count.
Player to watch
I’m going to cheat on this one and name two players. Jamie Benn and Tyler Seguin (probably no relation to Nick). Last season Seguin and Benn were on the sharp end of some of Stars’ CEO Jim Lites’ scathing comments. Benn’s 2018-19 season wasn’t exactly his career best, but Seguin’s almost was.
Stupid comments aside, Benn is interesting to watch to see if he can bounce back from last season’s poor (by his own standards) performance. Seguin is one to watch for the opposite reason: his 80 point season is his best since 2013-14 (84 points). Can he keep this up and go for a career high?
Biggest need
Some young players. The Stars have second oldest team on the conference. Omly Minnesota has them beat but only just, and they’re going to have a much worse season.
Coach Montgomery has a team with a lot of experience, but when the season ends, he’ll also have a lot of Unrestricted Free Agents. Presumably the Stars feel that this is their season, because they’re probably screwed next season.
If the Dallas Stars were an animal, what would they be?
The humble Kakapo. The world’s only flightless parrot. A big old bird with a life expectancy of up to 90 years. Not unlike the Dallas Stars, now that they’ve signed Pavelski and Perry. Usually a flightless bird would be pretty pointless, but the Kakapo, though rare, does surprisingly well for itself.