THG’s 2025-26 Dallas Stars Season Preview

THG’s 2025-26 Dallas Stars Season Preview

Welcome back. All right, uh, as I continue on with season previews, we’re wrapping them up today, actually. Uh, we’re going to talk about the Dallas Stars. Uh, Dallas is a team that has good scoring, at least they project to have good scoring, good defense, good goalending. Everybody’s voting for them as, you know, probably top two in the division. But I I do think that for for me, my concern with Dallas would be, was last year their best chance? Is this team going to be as good this year as last year? And I that’s the one concern I have, which part of this is all the rumors about Robertson. And so when Dallas fans are like, well, Robertson didn’t produce enough last year and he wasn’t good enough. Um, he had 80 points in 82 games. That’s pretty good. The problem is if you trade Robertson, you need to replace the points. And there aren’t very many teams out there willing to trade an 80 point forward right now. nor might they be willing to pick up Robertson who’s on, you know, he’s he’s he’s his contract comes to an end this year. He’s due for a huge raise. So, I don’t think trading him is is that easy for a team that wants to remain in cup contention. So, I think he’s going to be there once we get to the start of the regular season. Uh Robertson Hints and Rantin, will they have them all in the same line? Uh Roe Hint is an excellent firstline center. Rantin’s an excellent forward, but might they be better off to spread out. They’re spread the wealth, right? Uh will they all play together? We’ll see. Then you’ve got Ben. I’ve made a change to the lineup that’s on Puckedia here. I think Johnston ends up second line. They project Duchine as the second line center. Uh Duchain was their number one scorer, but he struggled in the playoffs. I understand Johnston had his struggles in the playoffs as well. But uh Wyatt Johnston is a young forward. His best days are ahead of him. For Duchine, you have to be concerned. Not only that, but Ben, Duchain, and Sean as the second line, it’s an old line. You combine the ages of those three, I’m pretty sure you’d get about 100. And so that’s that’s got to be at least some concern. I think you break that up. Uh so probably Ben Johnston and Sean. Uh that would leave your bottom six. Steel, Duchain, and Bourc. Maverick Bourc’s the one I’ve listed as the one to watch. Uh Maverick Bourc is a very good young forward who’s going to get every opportunity to score a little bit more this year. Uh Becka and Blackwell being the depth on that that forward in that forward group as well. Radic Fox returning after playing in St. Louis for a bit there. Uh now you look at the depth up front. Uh so the names in green here. Uh Bastion. So they’ve added Bastion from New Jersey. I would imagine that he’ll switch out with Blackwell or Beck. Maybe he ends up replacing Beck in the lineup at points. Uh then you got Hzuvian or Hzcoian. Rscoian. There we go. It’s a name that’s difficult. This is like my seventh take. Sovian is the name that I always have these these fears about because it doesn’t look like it sounds. Uh then you got Lind Wheatcraftoft, Macdonald, Strangest, Erdle, Seov, Arury, and Scott. Uh good forward depth. Not fantastic forward depth. if Dallas runs into numerous injuries up front, uh, depending on who gets hurt, there is a I would think some concern about how how that would affect them going forward. Basically, what I’m saying is Dallas may not have as much depth as some of the other contending teams and that can show up when you get into injury problems as the season rolls on. Uh, their blue line is solid. This is a good blue line. Uh, Lindell, Hastenan, we know what Hayeskin can do. They want a full season out of him. Uh Harley came into his own this past season in part because Hastin was out so Harley had to jump into that spot. Uh Labouchkin Bishell, we know Bishell’s going to be a a very good player uh from here going forward. And Lquist who’s stuck with it even though Dallas at times didn’t necessarily have a lot of faith with him. Lungquist is still here. Uh then you look at the depth and Kolia Chonik. So Kolia Chonic joins the team. I’d be surprised if he ends up in the in in the uh the the the list of healthy scratches. There’s the terminology. Um maybe Lquist ends up being the number seven and Kellronic jumps in there. Uh Cappo Biano, we know he can play here and there in your third pairing. Shouldn’t be a problem. Uh Kyru, Beruchi, White, Chris Punit, and Taylor rounding out the depth on the blue line. Beruchi’s considered to be a good prospect. probably not ready yet. Uh but Dallas is definitely a team that will be relying on that blue line I think a lot. And then there’s the goalending. The one area that you do not have a question mark with Dallas is goalending. Uh Auter and Des Smith both had good years. Uh Des Smith had a a very good year I thought and it’s backto-back good years now for Casey to Smith. So uh Dallas has got to be pretty confident their goalending. Then at the AHL level, Porier, uh, who helped them get to as far as they did in the playoffs in Texas, uh, this past spring before being eliminated by Abbottzford. So, there you go. And Cross rounding out the depth in goal for the Dallas Stars uh, at this point going into this season. But I I don’t anticipate a third goalender getting into a game unless there’s some kind of long-term injury, and I I’d rather not see that. So, I’m voting no on long-term injuries. I’m doing that for most teams this year, to be honest. Uh now the MVP I listed as Hints because I think for this team to really and truly uh finish first in the West and maybe go on a Stanley Cup final run and maybe win one. Uh I think Robe Hint is going to be a key guy for them. As I mentioned, the one to watch is Maverick Bourke. So we’ll see how many goals he gets, but he had a good rookie season. If he does end up playing with Duchine, like this could be a very good third line and a very good top nine overall. Cap space, no. uh $45,084 in cap space for the Dallas Stars. Um they’re not a team that has has cap space now, they probably won’t have any next summer either. Uh it is just it’s one of those prices you pay for being a really good team. And the Ransin contract’s part of that. So while I was excited they got Rantin, Rantin had a very good run in the playoffs, especially that second round. Uh I do worry that maybe that contract ends up costing him a little bit of depth and maybe that’s what we’re seeing here as well. Now the channel vote very optimistic 69% laugh away 69% vote them first or second 26% vote them third or fourth and 2% each for fifth or sixth as well as seventh and eighth. So the fact that only 4% of the vote has them outside the top four means the expectations are very high for Dallas. Uh the schedule it gets tough at times here. So six out of 11 are at home in October. Uh, eight out of 15 are away from home in November. So, it’s not too bad. That’s 26 games for the first uh two months. December, half of the games are at home and half of the games are on the road. So, seven home, seven away. And then January, January is the big month. And if you follow Red Letter Media, do you remember you? It’s January. Anyways, uh 11 out of 15 games are away from home. So yeah, January is going to be a a potentially rough month or we’ll be talking about how great a month it is because after that, well, the schedule still has its rough parts. Uh February with the Olympic break in there, uh four out of four games are at home. Every game is at home. And then in March, eight out of 16 are at home. So they have 16 game month. Uh eight and eight, eight home, eight away. and then April, uh, the reward for that very busy month of March, they have five out of seven games at home. So, there’s the possibility that Dallas could struggle in January and have a nice little run in April to end up finishing first in the division. That’s the kind of thing that can happen uh with a schedule like that. So, we’ll see how it ends up turning out. Now, Jim Nil gets a lot of credit as, you know, the best GM in the game. I honestly I think that yes, you could argue Jim Nil as one of the best, but Bill Zitto exists. So that’s that’s where I would put it is I’d have Nil and Zitto pretty much I want to say neck and neck, but Zitto’s got a couple of cup rings. So there’s that. Uh the coach this year is Glenn Gulletson. And my previous experiences watching Gulletson as head coach, he’s a good coach. Is he a coach that can get your team to win in the playoffs? That’s where I think there’s a question. And so it’s an interesting hire. I think Pete Dbor his exit was predictable after what was said about because here’s the thing. If you’re going to say, well, was bad against the Oilers. So was everybody else that series against the Oilers, the whole team struggled. So to go, well, it was the goalie’s fault. H there’s definitely some blame to go around. So looking at their record over the last four seasons, so back to 21-22, um they are fifth, 195 wins, 98 regulation losses, and 35 losses in overtime or shootouts. Uh their top five scorers over that four-year period. Robertson, 320 games played, 151 goals, 197 assists, 348 points. Those numbers are very good. Uh Hints, 309 games, 132 goals, 147 assists for 279 points. Uh Ben, 326 games played, 88 goals, 145 assists, 233 points. Uh Ben, not the forward that he was 5, six, seven, especially 10 years ago, but still can be productive at times. Uh Pavvelski, who of course is retired, 246 games, 82 goals, 143 assists, 225 points. Man, did they miss Pavvelski. Uh Hasten in 270 games, 30 goals, 158 assists, 188 points. Just thinking if Pavvelski was on this team, if he was on like a team friendly million-dollar contract, I understand that put him over the cap. They’d have to move somebody out, but that depth chart would look ridiculous if Pavvelski was was still around. But aging is a thing. Uh the one prospect that’s still by by my count unsigned of note, Emil Heming. Uh Dallas though having been a good team for a while, it makes sense that their prospect pool isn’t necessarily as deep as some of the other teams in the National Hockey League. their record this past season. I need to update this. That has not been updated. All right, that’s better. Uh 50 26 and six is the record for Dallas this past season. Duchain led them in scoring 82 games, 30 goals, 52 assists for 82 points. Jason Robertson, 82 games, 35 goals, 45 assists for 80 points. Uh Wyatt Johnston, 82 games, 33 goals, 38 assists for 71 points. Rope Hints, 76 games, 28 goals, 39 assists for 67 points. Uh, and Thomas Harley, 78 games, 16 goals, 34 assists for 50 points. Harley has a bomb from the point, has very good instincts offensively, and has shown himself to be pretty good on uh on on a pretty big stage. He has shown that he is as good as almost any other defenseman in the league. Now, the goalending numbers gooder uh 3618 and 4, 90 save percentage to Smith, mildly better 148-2 with a 915 save percentage. So once again, goalending the least of the concerns for the Dallas Stars. Looking at the playoffs the last 5 years, 2021, they did not qualify. So that was the year after they went all the way to the final. They didn’t make the playoffs in 21. 2022, they lost in the first round against Calgary in seven games. That was the series that made kind of a folk hero, of course. 2023 in the conference final, they lost to Vegas in six. 2024, they lost in the conference final against Edmonton in six. 2025 they lost in the conference final against Edmonton in five. So Edmonton’s been the issue for them the last two springs and conference finals have been an issue for them three straight years. So for Dallas, this does mean there’s expectations that are pretty high. It also means that going to a conference final is no longer going to be viewed as good enough. They have to be a Stanley Cup finalist to have shown any progression from previous seasons. It would help them if they stayed away from Edmonton, but the odds of Edmonton still being the team that comes out of the Pacific Division, I mean, the odds aren’t bad. It very well could be Vegas. The problem is it’s Vegas that beat them back in 2023. So, Dallas just needs to figure out how to get over the hump in those situations. Looking at the numbers from this past season, their power play was 17th at an even 22%. Their penalty kill was fourth at 82 point 82%. So, combined that’s 104. That’s not bad. Uh, their goals for, they were third in the league at 3.35 goals per game. Goals against, they were sixth at 2.71 goals against per game. I’m always surprised when Dallas isn’t top three, to be honest. I feel like defensively in a net, they’re very, very well put together. So, they should be top three, I would think, defensively. We’ll see if that happens this season. So, it’s going to be an interesting one. Let me know your thoughts. Uh, I do think that Dallas I have some nerves about Dallas this year I didn’t have last year. I do wonder if they’re if they’re going to have the same kind of season they did last year or if we’re going to see a little bit of regression. We’ll find out soon enough. Let me know your thoughts. Hit like and subscribe in the event you may not have done so already. Thank you guys so much for all your support as always. I will talk to you again soon.

The Stars are a top team, but there are depth concerns.

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