What Is NEXT For The Dallas Stars?

What Is NEXT For The Dallas Stars?

Well, it’s official. We have a rematch of the 2024 Stanley Cup finals between the Edmonton Oilers and the Florida Panthers. As last night, the Edmonton Oilers eliminated the Dallas Stars in the Western Conference Finals, defeating them six to3 on the road in game five. Overall, a pretty brutal showing by the Dallas Stars in the Western Conference Finals. And seeing as how this is now the third straight year Dallas has lost in round three, the second straight year to the Oilers, I figured I would make a video going over what went wrong for Dallas in this series against Edmonton and talk about where they go from here as they definitely have a very busy off season ahead. Let’s start by talking about last night’s game, specifically what happened in the first period that had everybody on social media talking. The Oilers obviously got off to a very hot start, scoring two goals on their first two shots of the game. One being a power play goal by Cory Perry, the other being a breakaway goal by Matias Yenmark. This led to Pete Dbor calling a timeout and after the timeout was over, Jakeer started to skate back towards the net, but then Dbor motioned for him to get back to the bench because he wasn’t going back in net as Dbor elected to pull Jakeer and go with Casey to Smith for the rest of the game. And listen, I get Dbor was trying to light a spark under his team. But to me, this was a panic move. I think in a game like this where your back is against the wall and you’re facing elimination, you have to ride it out with your franchise goalender who for the most part throughout the playoffs was very good. And honestly, when you look at the first two goals Edmonson scored on him last night, can you really blame him? One was a power play goal where Cory Perry was left all alone out front. And the second was a Matias Yenmark breakaway that he got thanks to a brutal Dallas Stars line change. Obviously, hindsight is 2020, but this turned out to be a pretty brutal decision by Peter Boris. The Dallas Stars would make it 3-0 less than a minute later after Jake was pulled. Jason Robertson tried his best to will Dallas back into the game, but in the end, the Oilers offense proved to be too much to handle. Now, obviously after the game, Pete Dbor was asked about his decision to pull Jay Cottoner in the first period. And honestly, his response was very shocking. I feel like this is as close to an NHL head coach completely throwing their goalender under the bus that you will ever see. As Pete Dbor said, I don’t blame it all on Jake, but the reality is if you go back to last year’s playoffs, he’s lost six of seven games to Edmonton, and we give up two goals on two shots in an elimination game, that’s a pretty big sample size. Now, I’m not going to sit here and say Auter had a great series against the Oilers because he definitely didn’t. But the much bigger problem in this series for the Stars was the fact that their offense completely dried up. They were only able to score five total goals over the final four games of this series and just five total five-on-ive goals in the entire series. That’s just never going to cut it against as prolific of an offensive team as the Edmonton Oilers are, no matter what kind of goalending you’re getting. So to me, those comments made by D’vor postgame were complete BS. You win as a team, you lose as a team. It kind of sounded like a guy talking who is expecting to be fired. Otherwise, I just don’t understand the decision to completely throw your franchise goalender under the bus like that, especially considering the lack of goal support he got in this series. I also find it kind of ironic that Dbor said he’s lost six of seven games to Edmonton dating back to last year’s playoffs. That’s a pretty big sample size. when Dbor has lost in the conference finals in six of the last seven seasons with three different teams. That’s also a pretty big sample size. So, we’ll see what ends up happening with that whole situation. I honestly wouldn’t be surprised if Dallas does decide to move on from Pete Tore as head coach because again, this is now three consecutive seasons he has been behind the bench where Dallas has lost in the Western Conference Finals. This star team obviously has an insanely talented core, but there’s definitely still some holes on this roster that need to be addressed heading into next season. Like I said, they have a very long off season ahead of them as they have a lot to do with very little cap flexibility. So, let’s now shift focus and start to talk about what Dallas’s off season could look like. We will start by looking at their pending free agents. UFAS include captain Jamie Ben, Matt Duchain who led the team in scoring during the regular season, Evani Datinov, Mikuel Granlin, Colin Blackwell, Brendan Smith, and Cody Cece. And their RFAS include Maverick Bourke and Niels Lungfist. There’s a lot of key names there. And yet, Dallas has less than $5 million in projected cap space. There’s obviously some key names here, and even if Dallas is able to move a few guys out to clear up some more cap space, there’s just no way they’re going to be able to bring all of these guys back. When I look at this list, I think the three players that Dallas definitely needs to prioritize are Jaime Ben, Matt Duchain, and Maverick Bourke, who I expect to play a much bigger role for the Stars next season. When it comes to Jaime Ben, he’s obviously going to be taking a significant pay cut on his next deal. If I had to guess what his next contract is going to look like, I would say something in the range of 1 to two years, 3 to 4 million per season. And obviously that right there would eat up the majority of Dallas’s cap space. Even if Matt Duchain is willing to come back on an identical one-year $3 million contract, the same that he signed with them the last two seasons, they’d still need to find a way to move some money out because that’s not even factoring in a Maverick Bourc extension. In terms of who are some players that Dallas could look to move to clear up some cap space, I think there’s four names that everybody is going to be looking at. two obvious ones, Matt Dumba and Ilia Labouchkin, who were both healthy scratches in game five last night. I think that should tell you everything you need to know about how those signings have turned out for the Stars. Another name is Mason Marchman. He has one year left at a capit of 4.5 million. Had a very underwhelming postseason. I could see them looking to offload his contract, although he does have a modified no trade clause. And another name I’ve been seeing a lot of people throw around is Tyler Sagen, who has two more years left on his deal at a capit of 9.85 85 mil per season. In a perfect world, I’m sure Dallas would like to try and get out from under the final two years of that deal. But the reality of the situation is Tyler Sagen has a full no move clause, and I doubt he would be willing to wave it. I think the two most realistic options from this list of four players are Matt Dumba and Mason Marchman. Matt Dumba is a given. I think whether it’s a buyout or they attach a pick to trade him to a team like San Jose or Chicago, he’s not going to be on Dallas next season. Mason Marchman is somebody that I think still has some value. So Dallas definitely wouldn’t have to buy him out. If they decide to trade him, I can’t imagine the return would be anything significant, but at the very least, he’s somebody that I don’t think they would have to attach a draft pick or a prospect to just to offload. So if the Stars are able to move at least those two guys, referring to Dumba and Marchman, that’s over $8 million in cap space that they would free up on top of the almost $5 million they already have in projected cap space. You’d think that would be more than enough to resign the likes of Jaime Ben, Matt Duchain, and Maverick Bourke. But even if they’re able to get all those guys signed, you’d think they’d still have to make a couple of depth signings to fill out the bottom six, unless they’re counting on some young guys to come in and contribute in depth roles who are still on ELC’s, which would be huge for this team. That all being said though, I think the biggest thing Dallas needs to address this off season is the right side of their blue line. Even if they’re able to move the Matt Dumba contract, I can’t imagine they’re going to want to head into next season with the right side of Miro Hastin, Ilia Labouchkin, and Alex Petravic. There’s definitely a clear need there for a top four right shot defenseman, which isn’t going to come cheap. It really feels like Dallas is going to have to pull off some cap gymnastics this off season if they’re going to want to put a solid supporting cast around this core heading into next season. And the crazy thing about that is it’s looking like next off season Dallas is going to be in even more of a difficult cap situation as both Jason Robertson and Thomas Harley are going to be restricted free agents. Both of those guys are going to be looking for massive extensions. And even with the cap going up again next off season, it’s going to be difficult for the Stars to make that work. If they can just find a way to keep this core together as best as they possibly can until 2027, they should be fine. And as in the summer of 2027, they will be getting a lot of cap relief with the NHL salary cap set to be as high as 113.5 million. And that is the off season where Tyler Sagen’s contract is off the books. But until then, Dallas definitely finds themselves in a pretty difficult cap situation with Miko Rantin’s massive extension kicking in. Like I mentioned earlier, I think it would be huge for this team if some young guys can come in and make an impact next season who are either on very cheap deals or still on their ELC’s. players like Christian Kyu and Antonio Strange or even somebody like Emil Hemming, although I feel like he’s still probably a few years away from competing for a roster spot. I think that is pretty much everything that I wanted to get to in this video. It is going to be a very fascinating off season for the Dallas Stars. I’m interested to see how it’s all going to play out. As always, I want to know what you guys are thinking, especially if you’re a Dallas fan. Sound off down below in the comments. What are some things you want to see the Stars do this summer to help try and get this team over the hump? And also let me know your thoughts on that whole Pete Dbor Jake situation. Do you think Pete Dbor should be back behind the bench next season? Do you agree with his decision to pulling? Do you not agree with it? Let me know all your thoughts down below. And if you made it all this way to the end of the video and you ended up enjoying yourself, please remember to leave a like. It’s the best way to let me know that you enjoyed and it does actually help out the videos a ton. And last but not least, if this was your first time checking out the channel and you want more NHL content just like this all year round, be sure to hit that subscribe button and I will talk to you all again soon. That’s not

Today we are talking about the Dallas Stars, who appear to have long off season ahead after a poor showing in the WCF. If you enjoy this type of NHL content be sure to subscribe to the channel if you are new!

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